PORT ANGELES — A new labor contract that gives 20 city electrical workers raises of 5 percent in 2013 and 5 percent in 2014 but which also has the employees paying more for health insurance was approved unanimously by the City Council this week after six months of mediation.
Approval of the contract is expected to stem the departure of city Utilities and Public Works employees and be helpful in attracting new applicants, city and union officials said.
The hourly pay for the line electricians will increase to $38 an hour in 2013 and to $39.91 in 2014, city Human Resources Manager Bob Coons said.
The wage increases consist of a 2 percent cost-of-living increase and a 3 percent “market adjustment” in each of those two years and will cost the city $187,000, Coons said.
As part of the four-year contract — the old pact that had expired Dec. 31, 2010, was extended — members of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 997 agreed to increase the percentage they pay of their medical premiums from 10 percent to 12.5 percent, Coons said.
That means employees who pay the family rate for health insurance will see their monthly premium payments of $183 increase to $229, Coons said.
“Hopefully, we’ve turned a corner on this and can move forward,” City Councilman and former Mayor Dan Di Guilio said at Tuesday’s City Council meeting.
Stop ‘outflow’
He added that he hoped the contract will “stop the outflow of journeymen to other utilities and allow us to attract utility members.”
The contract “shows we are looking at parity within the industry,” Public Works and Utilities Director Glenn Cutler said at the meeting.
“I talked to a couple of linemen who were looking at other places, and they indicated to me that at this point in time, they hope to continue their careers here in Port Angeles.”
Added Local 997 Business Manager and President Timm Kelly, in a later interview: “With the economic times, I think we accommodated the situation.”
The same person who successfully mediated a recent labor dispute between Service Employees International Union Healthcare 1199NW and Olympic Medical Center also adjudicated the dispute between the city of Port Angeles and IBEW Local 997.
Mediation sessions
Olympia lawyer Claire Nickleberry of the state Public Employment Relations Commission held three mediation sessions in Port Angeles after negotiations between the city and union broke down around February, Coons said.
Kelly and Coons said the issue was wages.
At least two line electricians had left city employment because the hourly rate was too low, Kelly said.
“The impasse was basically over the city holding the line for wages,” he said.
Coons agreed with that assessment, adding that the city originally had offered a two-year contract with no wage increases.
“That’s what mediation is about,” he said Thursday.
“We came up with a four-year contract, and it worked.”
The wage rate is now on par with Grays Harbor, Pacific and Mason counties but still about $1 less an hour than other utilities, Kelly said.
“Our trade has a wage rate they try to standardize, and that’s what this was about,” he said.
“The union is trying to work with the city and the community. We are involved in the community.”
Union members approved the contract July 9. Kelly would not disclose the tally.
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5060, or at paul.gottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
