The Streets Were Paved with Gold - Ken Auletta [184]
Free Parking: “The City shall provide locations adjacent to, near, or part of police precincts, headquarters and the courts as parking facilities for the personal use of police officers.”
Free pensions: “The City shall absorb the full cost of the pension contributions, and the employees present five (5%) percent contribution shall be eliminated.”
New pensions: “The City shall increase the contribution to the Annuity Fund for each employee [from $1] to Two ($2.00) Dollars per day for each day for which such employees is paid by the City.”
Sick days: “An employee shall be entitled to twenty-six (26) sick days a year, which may be accumulated without limitation. Each employee shall be credited with the full twenty-six (26) days on July 1 of each fiscal year.” Additionally: “An employee, who is on sick leave … may leave his residence or place of confinement at any time, and the City may not check, in person or by other means, on his whereabouts.”
Free subways: “An employee and his family shall be entitled to the free usage of the subways and buses when travelling to and from duty or while otherwise off duty.”
Limousine service: “Foot patrol employees shall not be required to maintain their post and shall be picked up by radio motor patrol car operators when the temperature falls below thirty-two degrees fahrenheit (32° F), the wind chill factor being taken into consideration.”
Blood days: “The present entitlement of blood days for each bleeding [donation] shall be increased [from one] to two (2).”
Vacation days: “From one (1) to three (3) years of continuous service—thirty (30) working days. In excess of three (3) years of continuous service—forty (40) working days.” Additionally: “Each employee shall receive 14 paid holidays annually”—an extra three days. Additionally: “An employee shall be given five paid leave days if he receives an award for outstanding police service.” Additionally: “An employee shall be entitled to eight (8) personal leave days for each fiscal year”—an increase of seven days.
Rewards for shooting people: “An employee shall be granted forty-five (45) days of leave of absence with full pay in the case where he is subjected, in the line or performance of duty, to a traumatic situation which shall include but not be limited to such instances as the fatal shooting of a criminal suspect, etc.”
The total cost of these demands, said the city, came to about $750 million extra just for the 18,000 members of the PBA. At the beginning of the negotiations, in March 1978, the Koch administration countered the PBA’s demands with its own list of “give-back” demands. At the end of the negotiations, in July, the city once again “gave in.” Each cop was offered a two-year 8 percent pay boost, or about $2,400. In addition, each would continue to receive a cost-of-living adjustment of about $1,200 annually. The holiday and night differential pay—which Koch pledged to eliminate—rose to match higher salaries. As was true of previous contracts, the city agreed to pay more for less work. City Hall offered to “give back” six chart days off in exchange for lengthening the average daily tour of duty by twenty minutes. Thus a cop would work eight hours and thirty-five minutes daily. Koch claimed cops would still be required to work 2,088 hours annually, so this represented no diminution of police service. But as the city learned when Lindsay granted chart days off in return for fifteen minutes of daily “briefing time,” these extra minutes cannot match six lost days of work.
“It’s a total capitulation,” complained one city negotiator. “Deputy Mayor Zuccotti went through a miserable summer but refused to budge and give back any chart days off. His successor, Don Kummerfeld, wouldn’t give in. Abe Beame, as miserable as he was, at least held the line, refusing to ‘give back’ any chart days. The cops pissed on his lawn, and he took it. Now Koch gives in without a fight.” True, Koch sought and won some changes—the police gave up their day off for donating blood, and their three annual