Midlands Voices: Blame union-friendly CIR for much of Omaha’s woes (this hits me)

[Omaha Steve]

Three of the last six years I didn't get a raise. This year I lost $ as I paid more on my pension. The writer calls that rocketing pay? The anti tax group is mad at police and fire, but threw civilian craft like me and management under the same bus. This is another group after public sector unions. Much of the info is not correct.

Thoughts? I'll come back to this thread tomorrow.

http://www.omaha.com/article/20101008/NEWS0802/710089983

Published Friday October 8, 2010

The writer, of Omaha, is executive director of the Plains States Legal Foundation.

Now that the City of Omaha has its new budget in place, the debate has quickly shifted to the $44 million in new tax dollars that were approved to fund additional contributions to the bloated pension plans of the Omaha police and fire unions.

Outrage stemming from this tax hike has been particularly sharp from the restaurant industry — angry over the new 2.5 percent levy on their customers’ tabs — and from residents of outlying areas upset with the City Council’s newly instituted “commuter tax.”

While these complaints are certainly legitimate, we should no longer be so surprised by the City Council’s continued capitulation to these public employee unions because, frankly, the fix is in.

The “fix” is something called the Commission of Industrial Relations (CIR). It is because of this five-member union-friendly board that said unions feel no need to compromise during negotiations.

The CIR was originally founded to prevent work stoppages (strikes) by public employees by arbitrating disputes between their unions and municipalities when they are unable to reach agreement on contracts.

On paper, this sounded like a good idea but has instead metastasized into an insider’s weapon highly unfriendly to Nebraska taxpayers, since the CIR is not required to factor in a city’s ability to pay, use comparable private sector wages or account for the area’s cost of living for the contracts that the commission imposes.

FULL story at link.