Board of Aldermen 07-13-2021 Page 17
that’s what they are asking for, they want to be able to say that we’ve got a safe City and they want to be able
to do the job that we are paying them to do and that’s all they are asking for.
President Wilshire
Alderman Schmidt?
Alderman Schmidt
Thank you Madam President. Through you to Alderman Dowd, how much extra was it for a $300,000.00
home?
Alderman Dowd
It was less than $1.00 a month.
Alderman Schmidt
$12.00.
Alderman Dowd
Yeah it was actually $10.00 and something for a year.
Alderman Schmidt
Thank you.
President Wilshire
Alderwoman Lu?
Alderwoman Lu
Thank you. | am not surprised that we are at (audio cuts out) and this Board feels another because it all, these
two items, these two departments boil down to the collective bargaining contracts that we approved as a body.
| believe that the Mayor was not in favor of, | don’t know, but we approved as a body. So when | looked at the
cost in the budget, what | found is that the Police payroll change, it went up and by payroll | mean number 51,
52 and 53 it went up $2.2 million. But the entire Police increase went up $2.18 million. So what that tells me
that the Police except for the uncontrollable cost, you know, the contractual costs that increased because we
approved a contract. If it weren’t for that they would have actually gone down.
And when | look at the Fire Department, | see that the payroll went up $1.84 million but the entire fire budget
only went up $1.66 million. So what that tells me is that they actually did cut back but they can’t cut back their
contracted payments. So | would support overriding the veto.
President Wilshire
Alderman Lopez.
Alderman Lopez
If | could add to what Alderman Lu had just said. | don’t know if the Mayor wants to comment on this but it is
actually my recollection that this is literally what the Mayor told us would happen both times that he vetoed the
contracts and we overrode it. The reasoning that we had in pushing to support the Fire and Police contracts
that were there was to maintain the integrity of the service to maintain competitive rates and neither of those
