Riverhead has settled collective bargaining negotiations with the Riverhead Policeman’s Benevolent Association, agreeing to a four-year deal that gives officers a 2 percent per year increase.
The PBA has been without a contract since the beginning of this year. The new agreement runs from Jan. 1, 2012 through Dec. 31, 2015.
The contract creates a new step number 6 in the pay scale paid to PBA members for officers hired after the ratification of the agreement.
The creation of the extra step saves the town money over the long term, since it takes a year longer for PBA union members to reach the top contract step.
Councilman John Dunleavy voted against the deal, in a 4-1 vote Tuesday afternoon.
“I’ve asked the PBA to start giving back to the taxpayers, but it doesn’t seem like it’s palatable to them,” Dunleavy said before casting his vote. Dunleavy is a retired Riverhead police officer.
Supervisor Sean Walter responded that the union agreed to a new pay step and that saves the town more than the health insurance premium contribution for new hires that the town had sought, according to an analysis done by the accounting department.
The agreement has been ratified by the PBA, Walter said after the meeting.
“All around it’s a pretty fair contract,” the supervisor said. “Our police department does a stellar job. I’m happy we’re able to resolve this.”
The town has not yet settled the collective bargaining agreement with the Riverhead Police Superior Officers Association. Walter said he expects that agreement will be reached soon.
The town reached a new collective bargaining agreement with the Civil Service Employees Association in March, for the period Jan. 1, 2012 through Dec. 31, 2015. The CSEA agreed to forego wage increases in 2012 and 2013, with a 1 percent increase in 2014 and a 1.5 percent increase in 2015. The contract also provided for a $200 payment at the end of 2011 and 2012 to all employees who were at the top of the union contract pay scale.
CSEA unit president Matt Hattorff said the PBA contract is “probably payback for the agreement they made two years ago when they laid off 13 of my people,” referring to the CSEA members laid off in 2010. The PBA at the time agreed to a one-week lag payroll, at the request of the town supervisor.
“We make the least and suffer the most,” Hattorff said. “We’ve always bent over backwards to work with the town,” he said.
CSEA members, though they agreed to no wage increases in the first two years of the contract, still receive automatic step increases of 1.25 percent per year, Walter said.
Hattorff said most of his membership is at the top of the scale and will only see the $200 bonus in the first two years of the contract.
“At the time it was a good settlement for what the economy was,” Hattorff said. The deal was approved by CSEA membership in an 88-33 vote.
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