WARREN Council to consider contract

The pact calls for 2 percent raises this year and in 2005 and 2006.
By DENISE DICK
VINDICATOR TRUMBULL STAFF
WARREN -- A second go at a contract between the city and the union representing its managers will be before council tonight with lower pay increases.
The pact with the Warren Management Association calls for 2 percent raises this year and in 2005 and 2006.
Councilman Alford L. Novak, D-2nd, said he expects to ask for first reading on the ordinance tonight.
Last month, council rejected an ordinance that would have given the 23 management employees a 3.5 percent increase this year and in 2005 and 2 percent in 2006.
Councilman Gary Fonce, D-at large, and Councilwoman Virginia Bufano, D-1st, were the only council members who supported that proposed pact.
Some of those who voted against the contract said they thought it was wrong to grant 3.5 percent pay increases for employees when residents are going to be asked to approve a 0.5 percent income tax renewal in August for the police and fire departments.
Gary Cicero, human resources director, said a section of the previous proposal calling for the contract to be reopened if the union representing police officers receives pension pickup has been removed.
Salary range
WMA members' pay ranges from $51,251 for the assistant auditorium manager for W.D. Packard Music Hall, planning coordinator, water pollution control and water maintenance supervisors, water operations supervisor and water office manager, to $71,760 for the community development director and director of the engineering, planning and building department.
Cicero said the only other change between the previously rejected proposal and the latest one is that health-care provisions and a drug and alcohol policy are effective Jan. 1, 2005, rather than when the contract is approved.
Those items can't be retroactive, he said.
The drug and alcohol testing policy allows the city to require drug screening or alcohol Breathalyzer test when "reasonable suspicion" exists, including on-the-job injury requiring medical treatment and vehicular accidents that incur damage more than $500.
The contract calls for employees to make a 10 percent copayment for hospitalization and prescription coverage.
WMA members have been working under a contract extension since Dec. 31, when the previous agreement ran out.