Police Voting on Raise; Initiative May Be Moot

Members of the San Diego Police Officers Assn. will vote today on a tentative agreement reached with the City Council on a two-year pay increase for about 1,500 officers and detectives.

Spokesmen for the POA and the city manager’s office declined to discuss the agreement except to say that some details have not been worked out. But sources from both sides say that reaching an agreement on pay rates, which was viewed as the main obstacle, has made it possible for the tentative accord to be put before the rank and file for a vote.

Sources familiar with the proposal say that it calls for a pay increase of 9% on July 1 for officers with two or more years’ experience, and an 8% increase in 1987. Officers with less than two years’ experience will receive 4% increases both years.

POA President Ty Reid said that officers will vote on the proposal at 11:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. today at the Al Bahr Shrine Temple in Kearny Mesa.

The two sides reached agreement on the plan last week after several weeks of meetings that began after the POA collected enough signatures to put a controversial police pay initiative on the June 3 ballot.

Still to be decided is what to do about the initiative, which calls for a 17% pay raise that officials say would cost the city $10 million the first year. The City Council voted last month to put the POA initiative on the ballot, alongside its own measure that affirms a City Charter provision giving the council sole responsibility for setting salaries for police and other municipal employees.

Jack McGrory, an assistant to City Manager Sylvester Murray, said, “It’s too late to pull the initiative off the ballot,” adding that both sides “are currently ironing out a solution.”

Like McGrory, Reid declined to comment on how the issue will be settled except to say, “We are discussing a proposal to work that out.”

A source familiar with the initiative who did not want to be identified said that one alternative being discussed is for the POA to campaign against its own measure so that it does not pass.

“It’s almost humorous. . . . but isn’t it also sad that the only way the city would come forth and negotiate with the POA is after the initiative gets qualified and can’t be taken off the ballot?” the source said. “The city really had to be pushed to the wall, and then some, on this one.”

Reid and city officials declined to say what the new proposal would cost the city, but sources familiar with the talks say it is being made more palatable to the officers by the city’s agreement to accept a four-day, 10-hour schedule instead of the traditional five-day work week.

POA officials say the pay increase is necessary to keep San Diego police salaries in line with those of other major law enforcement agencies in the state. Although San Diego is the second-largest city in California, police salaries rank 47th in the state.

Reid said that the two-year salary increases will bring San Diego police officers up to the average salaries earned by their counterparts in Los Angeles, San Jose, Long Beach, Oakland and the California Highway Patrol. Currently, a starting officer in San Diego earns about $20,000 a year, while officers and detectives earn a maximum salary of about $29,000 after five years. Those with ranks of lieutenant and above earn more.

The POA negotiates salaries for all police officers below the rank of captain, Reid said.