Reardon's budget would cut pay for Snohomish County workers

EVERETT — Snohomish County Executive Aaron Reardon's 2010 proposed budget would require more furloughs for county workers, while trimming pay for deputies and jail workers.

The County Council reacted cautiously to Friday's budget announcement, saying it plans to create its own budget from scratch. Patrol and corrections deputies, meanwhile, were shocked to learn they could be asked to give up more than 5 percent of their paychecks.

Those and other sacrifices are necessary to avoid layoffs, so county employees “can do their job without looking over their shoulder,” Reardon said. The public would notice no difference.

“Taxpayers receive reliability in their services and employees receive certainty in their jobs,” Reardon said.

The proposed 2010 general-fund budget is about $200 million — almost the same as the revised budget county leaders agreed to in March to sidestep a crisis.

This year, county employees were asked to take 11 furlough days. That's about a 4 percent pay cut. In Reardon's proposal for next year, they would take 12 to 15 days off without pay. The loss in wages would be about 5.7 percent.

Council Chairman Mike Cooper said he shared Reardon's priorities of saving jobs and avoiding service cuts. But Cooper wanted to look at different ways of getting there. Other counties, he said, have done things such as asking employees to give up holiday pay or vacation time.

Cooper also questioned whether it was wise to assume unions and guilds would agree to concessions.

“That's what bothers me a little bit,” he said.

Councilmen expect to send their version of the budget back to the executive's office before Thanksgiving.

The council has a responsibility to see whether the estimates in the proposed budget are accurate, Councilman Dave Gossett said. Accepting the executive's 2009 budget, Gossett said, would have left the county with a $9 million deficit.

Reardon has pointed out that his 2009 proposed budget was released before last year's financial meltdown. Gossett agreed that the turmoil on Wall Street upended many of the assumptions in the proposal, but wondered why Reardon or his staff didn't return to the council later to discuss it.

Union and guild leaders were glad Reardon has tried to avoid layoffs, but they had other concerns.

The president of the union that represents about two-thirds of the county's 2,700 employees said it's too early to reach any big labor agreements. Chris Dugovich of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees also wants assurances that all employees are making equal sacrifices.

“It's got to be across the board, it's got to be equitable,” Dugovich said.

Road and corrections deputies did not take wage cuts or furloughs last year, as most other county employees did.

Leaders with the public-safety guilds on Friday were surprised to hear from The Herald about the proposed 5.7 percent wage cut.

“Our struggle for fair and equitable compensation for our members will not change simply because the county executive chooses to circumvent the negotiation process by using the media as a sounding board to deal with his current budget crisis,” Snohomish County Corrections Guild first vice president Jeff Carroll said in a prepared statement. “In our current negotiation, we feel we have the support of the sheriff's office and it appears that the only stumbling block to securing an equitable contract by the end of the year is the executive's office.”

The executive's office says it let the guilds know during a July meeting that a wage cut might come up. Staff handed out copies of a letter signed by elected department heads, including Sheriff John Lovick, asking the executive to start furlough negotiations. The letter doesn't single out any group or mention any kind of pay cuts aside from furloughs.

“The wage reduction never came up,” said Adam Fortney, Snohomish County Deputy Sheriffs' Association president.

Unpaid days off might not work as a cost-saving move for public-safety agencies because they have to keep certain staffing levels.

“To meet the minimum staffing, you'd potentially have to call somebody in on overtime,” Fortney said. “That would defeat the purpose of trying to save money in the budget.”

The County Council has scheduled three meetings in October to gather public input on the budget. The council has until Dec. 1 to pass its budget. After that, the executive has 10 days to sign or veto it.






Noah Haglund: 425-339-3465, nhaglund@heraldnet.com.