Governor out-details the details
The police unions figure out a way to get around Deval Patrick's detail proposal and he figures out a way to get around them, at least on state road projects.
Outraged Liberal: He's come a long way, baby:
... Patrick's win reflects sound coalition-building politics. He worked with House Speaker Sal DiMasi and Senate President Terry Murray to present a united front in pursuing the change. And he didn't walk away, like Bill Weld, when the pressure was raised and loophole maneuvers commenced.
Obviously this latest move in the chess match will anger public employee unions. But with a looming ballot test on continuation of the state's income tax, Patrick and state leaders need to show they are doing their best to tackle spending. ...
Ed. note to Boston city councilors: You might want to remind your staffers to talk very quietly on Acela trains from New York, because you never know who might have no choice to hear them talking about the proper quotes their boss should give the Globe about the issue - because they don't realize just how loud they are. Bonus fun: You might want to ask any of your people if they were two cars ahead of the cafe car on the 6:03 p.m. train yesterday.
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State Money
Interesting how cities and towns perennially cry to their residents that the state simply isn't giving them enough local aid money - pick a year and a community and we can likely find a quote in a local paper. However, when it comes to the state actually putting terms and conditions on that money ... no fair! Ryan sounds like my 12 year old whining and complaining that I gave him money for lunch, but won't let him buy ice cream with it - only filtered though a press release robot.
49 states do this, and have for dozens of years. One state doesn't? Best practices anybody? The evidence is out there, the data are in. It works out fine, even in cities.
Although Shady may be right that it might be somewhat justified for local communities to hire their own cops to work on local projects. It makes sense if using cops provides flexibility and keeps more patronage payroll from being created.
Although Shady may be right
I think thats my only beef with the latest turn in the saga here. I think a city/town should be able to decide if projects in their borders should have flaggers or police details. Im thinking the threshold is low enough that most state run projects in my area will still need police details so Im not too concerned about it. Its the more rural areas that may be up in arms over it all. When it comes to private projects the city actually makes money off of the police detail as most cities collect a 10 percent administrative fee that more then covers the administrative costs of the details, I would hope that the municipalities would still be able to collect those fees even if they allow flaggers to be used. I realize it only amounts to less then 100,000 dollars in most mid sized municipalities but 75,000 is still a big enough chunk of change that it would hurt a little to lose it. The one really bright spot on all this is those cities that keep alot of police details will probaly see an increase in officers on the street actually doing the work as they will be concerned about losing the spots to civilians.
some states though
that are comparable to Mass like NY, CA or CT pay their cops 25% more....
Thats something I never
Thats something I never thought of looking into, it would be interesting to see if we are actually taking advantage of the cops around here with the detail system. Wouldnt it be hilarious if thats how this all turned out, that the cops all got raises to be competitive with CT and NY and didnt have to do the details forcing us to hire people to do that too.
My biggest worry
...is for the first civilians to actually work as flagmen. What do you think the chances are that they get pulled over after the first day on the job?
Shakedown street
Dat's a nice hole you got there. I'd hate for anything to happen to it.
What people dont understand
is that these state construction companies will have to hire union wages. It may not be $35 an hour like cops, but it will have to be more than Union apprentices that are getting paid $25 on these jobs anyway.
Boston is where the money is on these projects. You will not find any union worker on any site in the Boston area making less than $30 an hour.
sure, Maine and NH can hire whoever they want because you can get a nice house for 200K there and the cops get paid more anyway.
Id just hate to see what happens to the police state in MA when cops do either one of two things.
Not fine anybody for vehicle infractions (costing the state millions)
or fining everybody for everything like most states do. Giving them more court time and pay and probably costing the state more.
Then if its that bad, cops will have to find second jobs just to pay that mortgage that they banked on when they took the job.
I dont think you will see that many flagmen on most projects anyway....
I dont think we should take
I dont think we should take into account how much money each officer will lose if they lose their details. I know that sounds a bit mean spirited but come on if you look at any cities payroll the people on the top 10/100/1000 (depending on the size of the city) is dominated by police officers. Even without 100 percent of the detail money the top charts will still be covered by police officers. If they have to get a second job that is their business really, the rest of us do it (I have two jobs, and "consult" on the side, thats life.) Police officers, as a group, are the highest paid employees in most municipalities and will remain so regardless of how the detail stuff plays out.
That being said I am for keeping police details in many cases because I like the extra coverage it offers.
Good point
But why not just cut teachers salaries and see how many actually leave? Or change their collective bargining agreements so that they are forced to work other jobs to make them "full time" for the municipality.
And these "payrolls" are not all comming from the cities and towns. Details are paid by private contractors and sometimes state tax money.
Thats where the key issue is. If the state finds out that they have to hire union labor for these "flagmen", they will not really be saving any money.
If I can come up with a way
If I can come up with a way to make sure kids get tutored during the school year and severly cut down the amount of time needed in Summer School would you object because too many teachers would lose their ability to teach summer school and rake in extra cash? There is a difference between essential functions and fringe functions. For instance a teacher teachers his class during the day, thats his essential function. He can choose, in some places at least, to coach the football team as well, thats a fringe function. If we were to cut the football team due to budget contraints the football coach would not be promised work elsewhere, he would go back to only teaching history. The same goes for our history teacher, if for some reason we were to lose the need for summer school the teacher would no longer be needed for that function. The thing with teachers is it is very uncommon to find a teacher in the top pay listings in any city, and many times they are expected to have far greater amounts of education now then any other people in local government (of course many people in local government have all sorts of advanced degrees but most of those are not because the state insisted they have them, its because that made them the best person for the job.) A teachers job includes time in the class room and time out of the classroom grading, reading, taking classes, and preparing for class. I would venture out on a limb and say many teachers probaly work more then 40 hours a week on average for the year for the main part of their jobs (which doesnt include coaching and extra curricular activities.)
I am not in disagreement with you over how much flagmen will get paid. Ultimatly a contractor will be picked, and soemone will have to pay them for the flagmen which increases the price. My point was that Im not on this side of the fight because I feel bad for a cop who makes three times as much as I do losing 10,000 a year in easy detail work.
I guess I meant
that now the state can possibly change contracts in other ways. Maybe they want to rearange the step program so that a 20 year teacher gets paid the same as a 5 year teacher. Or maybe the state can say firefighters have to work 2 10 hour shifts a week, or even say that police officers that qualify as firefighters can step in to do shifts in order to save overtime?
Overall I think this is bad for unions more than it is going to be bad for police details.
The next step might be forcing muni unions (teachers, cops, firefighters) to give up good health plans (blue cross/tufts) and force them into these lesser quality socialized health programs.
Or, no one at all
I would like to think that the new rules would reduce costs because there are many instances when a construction site doesn't even need a flagperson, let alone a police officer. Thus, no union person should be hired either.
But I think
some of these rules are in place anyway. In many towns, the DPW can close streets and not hire a police detail if they dont want to. But if traffic needs to be stopped, or pedestrians need to be crossed, a police officer or flagman would be needed.
One reason I like cops over
One reason I like cops over flaggers is because I HATE crossing guards. They cant keep those damn kids in line and always stop traffic whenever they feel like it without worrying about how they are ruining the traffic pattern by interupting a green arrow that is only on for 10 seconds every 2 minutes. Ive seen a cop do that same piece of land during a period of construction and he was able to keep the kids under control and keep traffic flowing BETTER then we would do with just the lights alone. When it works it works, I just wish it would always work like that and we wouldnt be having these discussions
Cops vs. crossing guards
As somebody who has to drive right by Holy Name School in West Roxbury before classes start, I have to say it really depends:
They used to have a crossing guard who was just terrible for traffic - she was the sort of person you described and traffic would be backed up to the other side of the rotary (which, if you know West Roxbury, is saying something). The guy they have now, however, is really good - he only lets the kids/parents cross when they have a green light. In contrast, those times when a cop (well, a trooper, since it's officially a state road) has to fill in, ugh, forget it.
Makes sense, that state
Makes sense, that state trooper doesnt know the road hes messing with, he could be from anywhere. A local cop should know their community well enough to know what his actions in that crosswalk will translate to down the road. Your right though, anyone can be good at directing traffic if they know what they are doing and follow the logical patterns.
I dont know why my local crossing guard doesnt get it, try to cross people only during official walking periods. Sure I understand it if a kid goes into the street anyway, might as well run out and stop traffic, but many times it will be a woman with a stroller who is obviously not going to run across the street, theres no need to ruin the traffic flow for that.
Adam's note about quotes
In light of that, I find the wording of this one particularly interesting:
Does not make me more inclined towards their p.o.v.