HUNTINGTON BEACH : Firefighters Get Pay Increase of 19.5%

After two years of bitter negotiations, the city’s firefighters have secured a pay package that increases their salaries 19.5% over a three-year period.

The City Council approved the pay raise in a 5-1 vote Monday night.

The firefighters will receive lump sums, ranging from $8,000 to $14,000, in retroactive pay for the past two years.

The three-year package is essentially the same one the city gave to police and other unionized city workers in 1990--before the onset of recessionary woes.

But Councilman Peter M. Green, who cast the lone vote against the firefighters’ raises, warned his council colleagues that their support of such substantial raises came at a poor time.

Green noted that the budget is already strained and that problems will get worse if the state Legislature cuts funding to city governments.

“This would be sending a clear signal to Sacramento that we’re affluent,” Green said. “I find it very difficult to bestow such largess on firefighters when the city is facing such difficult (budgetary) problems.”

A large audience of firefighters sat in the audience while Green spoke.

The audience burst into laughter when Councilman Jack Kelly jokingly asked Green: “Hey, you don’t smoke in bed, do you?”

Green, who is completing his second four-year term, cannot run for reelection under a city law that restricts council terms.

Councilman Don MacAllister said he is also concerned about the city’s finances. However, he said, it would be unfair to deny firefighters the pay raise that other city employees have already received.

Two years ago, the firefighters rejected essentially the same package, saying it wasn’t enough. Four months later, firefighter representatives came to council meetings, denouncing the city’s offer and personally attacking City Administrator Michael T. Uberuaga.

However, it was Uberuaga who on Monday night urged the City Council to grant firefighters the raise.