City to Borrow $85K to Cover NY Firefighters' Raises

TROY, NY—The city plans to borrow $850,000 to pay for the costs of an arbitration decision awarding back salary to the city’s firefighters, according to the City Council Finance Committee issued Friday.

The memo explaining the need for the borrowing filed by Mayor Patrick Madden’s administration states, “The City is not able to finance this payment through cash flow regardless of the current executive order and emergency declaration pertaining to the Covid-19 virus.”

The city has to borrow the money to pay retroactive salary increases for the Uniformed Firefighters Association contract of 2 percent effective July 1, 2018, 2 percent effective Dec. 31, 2018 and a total pay increase of 4.04 percent from Jan. 1, 2019 to the present.

The debt would be repaid over five years.

A spokesman for Madden did not respond to a request for comment Friday about seeking City Council authorization to issue the bonds.

“While it’s unfortunate thousands of taxpayers’ dollars and UFA union monies were spent to get to this decision, I believe it’s important for the City Council and the mayor to honor this arbitration award,” Council President Carmella Mantello said Friday.

The city announced that an arbitration award had been issue in the case between the city and the firefighters union. The city listed the salary increases and said the arbitration panel agree with the city’s position on increasing co-pays for health insurance. These increases were for office visits from $20 to $25; emergency room visits from $35 to $100; outpatient surgery from $20 to $100; and prescription increases from $5/$15/$35 to $10/$25/$45.

"We recognize that wage demands by the UFA were not met by this award, and therefore remain a point of concern for those employees, as well as for the City's administration. The City is acutely aware of the financial impact of these wage demands, particularly as they may affect Troy’s taxpayers,” the mayor’s office statement said last week.

“It is the City’s position that all components of labor agreements must be scrutinized with consideration of current and future changes in healthcare, pension, and workforce trends. While these changes may be difficult to accept and implement, they are critical now and in the future and will enable the City to provide necessary public services, while maintaining its financial health,” the statement said.

The Finance Committee meeting will be held at 6 p.m. Thursday. Due to the coronavirus pandemic, City Hall is closed to the public. The meeting will be held via videoconferencing. Additional information about the meeting will be posted on the city calendar at www.troyny.gov/events/.

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