Tonight the City will have its first budget study session to examine the budget for 2012-2013, of course you may be all asking, “but hey, didn’t we just finish the 2011-2012 budget? Absolutely, but give the five year forecast if no changes are made to the City’s Budget, the City will run out of reserves to spend down by 2015 -16 and I don’t think anyone — short of a few serious Alameda haters out there — wants to see that happen.
So here is the Powerpoint in preparation for tonight’s meeting, can I just say I seriously hate the way that the City’s website handles PDFs right now? I hope that will change whenever they get around to fixing the website.
A few really interesting slides in the presentation include comparisons of Alameda to other Bay Area cities my only critique is that the cities used as comparison is not standardized for all the slides.
Unsurprisingly some cities that outsource their police and/fire services appear to be financially healthier than Alameda. Like Dublin (police and fire) and Pittsburg (fire). Dublin has an impressive 77% when comparing General Fund Reserves as a percentage of Expenses. Pittsburg is up there with 48%. In comparison, Alameda has only 21%, but other cities are faring much worse than Alameda including Union City (12%) which also outsources its Fire Services and San Leandro (12%) which also outsources Fire.
Here is a good slide which contains the percentage of the General Fund spent on Public Safety:
Here’s where the standardizing of cities would have been helpful. It would have been interesting to see how much Dublin, since it outsources both fire and police spends on their public safety. While Alameda is on the higher side with only the City of Richmond spending more on public safety, cities like Pittsburg and Union City which contract with larger County Fire Departments don’t have a considerable savings over Alameda. On the other hand, cities like Livermore and Pleasanton which formed a two-city Fire Protection District have considerable savings.
One place that Alameda appears to be out of whack with other cities is the number of Firefighters per 1000 residents:
The City of Union City — which outsources their Fire Services — has almost 1/3 less firefighters per 1000 residents than Alameda. Although I have to say that given how sparse the coverage seems for Union City, one would expect their percentage of General Fund spent on public safety would be a lot less. It appears that Alameda could get some cost savings by bringing that ratio more in line with other cities.
A few of the questions posed by City Staff on how to move the budget forward include:
- Do we address the deficit through structural changes to our budget or through both structural and one-time fixes?
- Do we focus on program elimination/workforce reductions and/or items requiring employee contract negotiations?
- Do we employ across the board cuts, or should we be more surgical?
Clearly the answer is a little bit of everything, but I think that one thing that should not be done are across the board cuts. While 10% may be a blow, it won’t cripple a larger department like Fire or Police, but it could annihilate smaller departments like the Library or Public Works. Although given how angry folks probably are with the Public Works Department over the lack of proper noticing on Park Street with regard to the tree removal, people may not be crying so hard over a slash in that budget.
There is also a question about raising revenues through more taxes like sales taxes, Transient Occupancy, etc, but there are serious structural issues within the City that should be resolved before heading down that route.
Finally, the PowerPoint gave a sneak preview of a Budget Challenge which would be a tool — I imagine in the vein of the LA Budget Challenge, the website is not available anymore, but this guy took screenshots of the Budget Challenge if you want to take a look — to balance the budget yourself. I did try to see if the web address was working yet (it wasn’t when I checked yesterday), but hopefully will be made available soon. The good thing about the Budget Challenge is that it should give the City a good idea of what residents prioritize when it comes to services in the City more than just people storming the City Council meetings to simply advocate for whatever their pet issue of the day is. Because if you want the City to continue to fund one thing, chances are something else is going to get cut. This tool will allow people to think and decide holistically and understand that the budget cannot be decided in a vaccum.
Is the fact that all our firefighters are also EMT’s what puts our numbers up? Do other cities have a separate category for EMT’s? If so what is their combined total? I’m not sure how all this works.
Comment by Kate Quick. — October 25, 2011 @ 6:48 am
Hi Kate: I think that is an excellent question, I didn’t get a chance to do more research on the topic. I understand that Alameda’s paramedics do account for the ratio being so high as compared to other cities, but that’s not what is reflected in the graph. As I wrote, the lack of standardizing of the cities used to compare Alameda to makes it difficult to really compare apples to apples. But hopefully I’ll have some time to look into it more.
Comment by Lauren Do — October 25, 2011 @ 9:08 am
In 1978 til 1995 Police and Fire Recieved about the same amount of funding from Prop 13. 15-16%.
Police departments received generally the same amount of funding, from 15% in 1978 to 16% during 1995.
The Based Closed in 1997 and we knew about it 3-4 years prior.
Now those departments are now 70% of Budget that were 30-32 % of Budget.
Department Of Labor Statistics
Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2010
33-2011 Firefighters
Control and extinguish fires or respond to emergency situations where life, property, or the environment is at risk. Duties may include fire prevention, emergency medical service, hazardous material response, search and rescue, and disaster assistance.
Employment estimate and mean wage estimates for this occupation
Annual Wage 47,730
http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes332011.htm
http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Fire_Fighter/Salary
Earnings About this section
Median annual wages of fire fighters were $44,260 in May 2008. The middle 50 percent earned between $31,180 and $58,440. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $22,440, and the highest 10 percent earned more than $72,210. Median annual wages were $44,800 in local government, $45,610 in the Federal Government, $25,300 in other support services, and $37,870 in State governments.
Median annual wages of first-line supervisors/managers of fire fighting and prevention workers were $67,440 in May 2008. The middle 50 percent earned between $53,820 and $86,330. The lowest 10 percent earned less than $40,850, and the highest 10 percent earned more than $108,930. First-line supervisors/managers of fire fighting and prevention workers employed in local government earned a median of about $69,000 a year.
According to the International City-County Management Association, average salaries in 2008 for sworn full-time positions were as follows:
Position Minimum annual base salary Maximum annual base salary
Fire chief $78,672 $104,780
Deputy chief 69,166 88,571
Battalion chief 66,851 81,710
Assistant fire chief 65,691 83,748
Fire captain 60,605 72,716
Fire lieutenant 50,464 60,772
Engineer 48,307 62,265
Fire fighters who average more than a certain number of work hours per week are required to be paid overtime. The threshold is determined by the department. Fire fighters often work extra shifts to maintain minimum staffing levels and during special emergencies.
http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos329.htm
Comment by John — October 25, 2011 @ 9:30 am
Kate is on the right track, however there is even more to the equation. NONE of the other fire departments listed on page 20 of the power point presentation provide the Transport Ambulance Service that Alameda Firefighters DO provide. Service for service, would be more accurately compared to the Berkeley Fire Department (with the exception of a higher City population in Berkeley and the Public Safety Tax Measure GG that secured their funding).
By providing the Transport Ambulance Service in Alameda, there are additional firefighters on duty every day that actually GENERATE 2.4 Million dollars in revenue from providing that service. NONE of the other fire departments listed on page 20 of the power point generate revenue like that.
Additionaly, while Alameda seems to be a safe place to live, work and raise a family, we are actually made up of many medium and high hazard buildings that present significant challenges to fire and emergency response. Given our geography of being an island community, we do not have the possibility of a converging mutual aid response. Being surrounded by water means that any resources coming in to help us have limited access points and lengthy cross town response times.
As we detailed in our “Town Hall” meetings in 2009 when Station 5 and Engine 5 were closed, Alameda is AT AN ALL TIME LOW in numbers of Firefighters and Emergency Resources.
Comment by Domenick Weaver, President Alameda Firefighters IAFF Local 689 — October 25, 2011 @ 9:33 am
Just use the CPI calculator on total salary benefits and pension from 1995 when the costs were under control and see what that does to Budget on Each employee.
http://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm
Comment by John — October 25, 2011 @ 9:37 am
The Alameda Fire Dept has 17 people whose total compensation cost the citizens of Alameda between $200,000 –$ 275,000 last year. Another 55 whose earnings and benefits were between $150,000 and $200,000.
The median expected salary for a typical Fire Fighter in the United States is $41,308. I’m sure there is happy median between 41K and 275K. This basic market pricing report was prepared using our Certified Compensation Professionals’ analysis of survey data collected from thousands of HR departments at employers of all sizes, industries and geographies.
http://www1.salary.com/Fire-Fighter-Salary.html
Comment by John — October 25, 2011 @ 9:39 am
John: The median salary you keep touting doesn’t include total compensation (benefits, etc…) and you are pointing out the AFD’s total compensation. I think it’s a bit disingenuous to compare the two as though they are comparable figures.
Comment by Lauren Do — October 25, 2011 @ 9:44 am
Lets add 25% to the median salary of 41K and include benefits and that makes it 51K. Lets go crazy and add 40% for benefits and that makes it 57K.
Comment by John — October 25, 2011 @ 9:55 am
John: I did a quick review of the salaries you referred to and nearly all of those employees were management level aka Fire Chief, Battalion Chiefs, Fire Captains, etc… yet the rate you are quoting is for a “typical” Firefighter, which none of those individuals are.
Comment by Lauren Do — October 25, 2011 @ 9:57 am
The Average Firefighter in Alameda will retire with the Equivalent of 5- 7 Houses Fully paid for and be able to retire between 50-55.After recieving double the Average Pay of a Federal Firefighter while working for City.
The Captains and above recieve the Equivalent of 10-12 Houses fully paid for upon retirement all financed by the Citizens of Alameda.
In the meantime the Citizens will sacrafice anything of any value to them to support these compensation packages and titer on Bankruptcy.
Comment by John — October 25, 2011 @ 10:08 am
According to the International City-County Management Association, average salaries in 2008 for sworn full-time positions were as follows:
Position Minimum annual base salary Maximum annual base salary
Fire chief $78,672 $104,780
Deputy chief 69,166 88,571
Battalion chief 66,851 81,710
Assistant fire chief 65,691 83,748
Fire captain 60,605 72,716
Fire lieutenant 50,464 60,772
Engineer 48,307 62,265
Lauren Compare these to AFD
Comment by John — October 25, 2011 @ 10:11 am
Kevin Kearney has spoken up for YEARS regarding pay and pensions . If you chose not to hear it til the Treasure and Auditor had to pour their frkn hearts out about their love for this City and watching it implode while the Mayor and Council live on Denial Avenue and listen to Firefighters Union about theres plenty of money look at the reserves. It’s Pathetic while whole City Sacrifices.
To quote Make it go Away
““Rank and file” cannot make $90,000+ to $200,000 a year and retire at 50 with full medical and dental for them and their families. Use some other way to refer to them, like upper middle class, or highly paid public servants… I admire the police and fire in some ways, but Kearney is right. They make too much GD money, they get false promotions to pump up their pay right before they retire at 50 and the model is unsustainable. How can we trust public officials to do our negotiating when they have done such an abysmal job so far(and I mean by this the previous city councils and city managers and professional negotiators)?”
Lauren No one wants this City to go BK and we all respect Police and Fire we just need to get these costs under control .
Comment by John — October 25, 2011 @ 10:26 am
4: Domenick Weaver is correct, and his clarifying comments at the budget workshop tonight were welcomed by the city staff.
Unique community needs necessitate individualized approaches to maintaining public safety. Alameda is an island full of older wood-framed homes….
Comparing Alameda to Berkeley, Palo Alto, San Francisco, and other cities where fire departments provide ambulance service will yield far more comparable stats when examining the number of sworn firefighters per 1,000 in population. So will factoring in geography, demographics, climate, and a host of other variables when comparing public safety budgets (fire and police services).
For example, we recently learned the hard way that we needed to have 24/7/365 local capability to offer water rescue, which had shortsightedly been allowed to lapse and/or been cut in order to save money.
That said, perhaps we can learn something from other similar-service-level jurisdictions about doing more with less..
Comment by Jon Spangler — October 25, 2011 @ 11:44 pm