PERRYSBURG – A conciliator has thrown support behind city firefighters’ request for a 6.25-percent wage
increase next year.
Conciliator Colman Lalka recommended on Sept. 3 that the city approve the increase for next year as well
as a wage reopener in 2011. There would be no raise this year. The city had argued for a 2.75-percent
increase this year retroactive to March and then again next year with a provision for reopening wage
negotiations the following year.
Based on information submitted during arbitration, the conciliator found it financially feasible for the
city to pay the wage increases requested by the International Association of Firefighters Local 3331 and
the department of approximately 20 people.
"Through what appears to the Conciliator as brilliant fiscal management, the City of Perrysburg has
not suffered the general fund/budget debilitating effects of the current economic downturn as have other
communities," Lalka wrote in his report.
The city had contended that its finances were nonetheless impacted to some degree, with projected 2010
income taxes remaining at the 2007 level. An increase in the taxes for 2008 was attributed to an
anomalous quarter that year and the trend is not expected by the city to repeat.
The union also argued that the communities used by the city as comparables experienced worse financial
conditions than Perrysburg.
The union further contended that firefighters and members of the police department should be treated
comparably. The city conceded this point to the conciliator but added this is not always the case and
indeed has not been until this point.
The conciliator noted that "other than the broad statement that Police and Firefighters perform
different functions and should be treated differently, no other rationale was provided for the disparity
in wage increases between Police and Firefighters."
The city had previously denied a fact-finder’s report on wages for firefighters, which recommended a
3.25-percent increase this year and a 3-percent increase in 2010. Those rates were approved for the
police bargaining units earlier this year.
The union’s final settlement offer results in a total wage increase of $69,436, while the fact-finder
recommendation denied would have resulted in an increase of $70,519. The city’s offer would have cost
$61,944.
On the points made by the union, as well as the provision for reopening wage negotiations in 2011 to
accommodate potential economic downturn, the union’s offer was deemed "the more reasonable of the
two."
Lalka stated that the city’s offer "would result in an unjustified wage distortion between Police
and Firefighters, not only over the life of their current Collective Bargaining Agreements, but into the
future as wage increases are granted on a percentage basis."