Tentative Agreement Vote Postponed between Labor and City of South Lake Tahoe

UPDATE:(October 18, 12:30pm) The vote on the Tentative Agreement between General & Public Works and the City of South Lake Tahoe has been postponed to give both parties more time for review. The employee group will meet and vote on Friday, October 21. City council will then vote on the agreement at the next meeting which has not yet been scheduled.
"It was just too fast," said City of South Lake Tahoe Human Resource Director Janet Emmett. "It was obvious that they needed more time to educate their members and then we would need more time to review the agreement as well."
Meanwhile, the city council meets at 2pm today for the special budget meeting, and is expected to approve the layoff of 19 employees. This number is lower than the original proposed cuts in staff, and will spare the Streets Department from losing more than half of its workers.

A tentative agreement for a contract has been reached between the General and Public Works negotiating team and the City of South Lake Tahoe, according to Steve Crouch of the Stationary Engineers Local #39. Votes from both parties are still required to solidify the agreement. The employees will meet Monday, October 17 to ratify or reject the agreement before it goes to the city council for consideration during closed session at the October 18 city council meeting. The city is facing a $5.2 million budget deficit and is struggling for solutions before the interim budget expires at end of the month.
“I’m not excited about it, but I’m not angry about it either, said Crouch, representative for the group. “I am confident that people will see that having a contract is better than no contract.”
The unofficial word is that the layoffs have been reduced to roughly a dozen people, and that the street department positions were salvaged. There is also a two-year service credit toward Public Employees’ Retirement System (PERS) being offered, which could be an incentive for those near retirement.
The labor group will also propose several strategies to continue to stabilize the city’s budget issues over the next few years. Crouch says the goal is to prevent this kind of budget and labor situation from happening again.
“New revenue streams need to be explored until such time the economy recovers and sales and property taxes return to pre-2006 levels,” he said. “An increase in TOT taxes, even if it is just temporary, of 1 to 2 percent can bridge the gap and preserve services at their current levels until the economy recovers.”
These ideas, said Crouch, are outside of the realm of negotiations, but should still be considered by the city as alternatives to cutting jobs and depriving residents of crucial services.
South Tahoe Now learned this information Friday, October 15, and will attempt to contact city officials Monday October 17, for comment or verification.