As union turns up heat, city stands pat

Almost every weekday morning, about a dozen angry firefighters with picket signs greet the mayor on his way to work.

Their beef: They've been three years without a contract, and it's the city's fault for not budging on a clause about absences.

Firefighters object to a contract provision that allows the city to demand a doctor's note if they stay home from work because they are ill or caring for a sick child or spouse.

What's more, the firefighters say Mayor David B. Cohen is singling them out with this rule.

"How come he's discriminating against the firefighters?" asked Fran Capello, firefighters union president, in a recent interview.

City officials say that contracts for all the unions give the city the right to ask for a doctor's note. They say they began enforcing the provision with firefighters after the cost of overtime to cover their shifts exceeded $1 million two years in a row.

In 2002, for example, firefighters called in sick 14 percent of the time they were scheduled to work, compared with 5 percent for police; 5 percent for highway and parks and recreation employees; 4 percent for human services employees and library custodians; and 3 percent for inspectional services employees, records show.

Cohen said the city can't afford to back down on the sick-note issue.

"This is something the firefighters agreed to, and we believe there are compelling reasons for retaining it," the mayor said. "If we had to go back to the old levels of overtime, it would mean we would have to reduce personnel and services."

The firefighters union and the city are in mediation to break the deadlock.

It is not unusual for municipal contracts to have a clause requiring a doctor's note after sick leave, according to James Lampke, executive director of the statewide City Solicitors and Town Counsel Association. Businesses are also using the policy, he said.

The dispute in Newton is more about enforcement. It dates back to 2000, when city officials began looking for a way to curb firefighter s' overtime by enforcing a policy that had been in the contract since the early 1970s.

Unlike other city employees, firefighters work 24-hour shifts, called tours. They are allowed 7 1/2 tours per year for sick leave. Overtime is reimbursed at time-and-a-half pay.

Firefighter overtime had cost the city $626,945 in fiscal 1999 and $860,816 in fiscal 2000, but soared to $1,164,200 in fiscal 2003 and $1,279,656 in fiscal 2004, according to city records.

During the same period, the city saw a steady increase in firefighters' use of sick time. They called in sick for only 652 tours in 1994, but the number rose to 1,215 in 2000, 1,011 in 2001, and 964 in 2002, records show.

The absentee records are kept in calendar years as opposed to fiscal years, which run July 1 to June 30.

After September 2003, when officials began enforcing the doctor's-note policy, sick leave plummeted. The number was down to 408 tours in 2004 and 476 tours in 2005, records show.

"We've saved $500,000 to $750,000 every year of taxpayers' dollars in tough fiscal times," Cohen said about the doctor's-note policy.

Capello says city officials are manipulating the numbers in order to make the firefighters look bad.

He said the surge in overtime was in part a result of vacant positions. Cohen denies that his administration has doctored the books. "It's not true," he said

Indeed, in 2003, the city had 18 vacancies, but 10 were filled by October and the remainder by 2004, according to Dolores Hamilton, city personnel director. The city now has 174 firefighters. As the ranks were filled, sick leave and overtime dropped by more than half.

But recently, the absentee rate has been steadily climbing. As of the end of September this year, firefighters had already taken 615 sick tours. That compares with 350 over the same period in 2005.

The city took note and docked the pay of four firefighters this month who had refused to bring a doctor's note after being out sick.

"This is what upsets me so much," Capello said. "If everybody had to do it in the city, that's OK. Can you imagine how much we'd save if we did it with everybody in the city?"

Some members of the city's other unions have demonstrated in support of the firefighters. At a recent protest in front of City Hall, police officers and teachers marched with the firefighters.

Cheryl Turgel, president of the Newton Teachers Association, whose contract expired in August, said she believes it's unfair for the city to enforce the doctor's-note policy on all firefighters, when only a handful may be abusing sick leave.

"If it can happen to them, it can happen to any of us," she said.

Still, Turgel said that her union probably would not hold up contract ratification over the policy.

"We don't have a problem with excessive absenteeism," she said. "We know if somebody does have to be out for a long time, they do get a doctor's note."

Police officers recently settled a contract including the doctor's-note clause.

"We don't have a lot of sick-time use," said Jay Babcock, patrolmen's union president. "The same problem doesn't exist in the police department."

City officials said they enforce the doctor's-note provision with teachers and police officers only in cases where they suspect chronic sick-time abuse.

Capello said firefighters have offered a compromise under which the city could demand a note if a firefighter has called in sick more than three times in a year.

Jeremy Solomon, city spokesman, said it was improper for him to comment on negotiations. "This is a matter for bargaining, not a matter for back-and-forth in the newspaper," he said.

Last April, the firefighters union filed for arbitration with the state's Joint Labor Management Committee, which handles such deadlocks. Mediation has begun, and the committee will decide whether the city and the union must face binding arbitration.

Arbitration has already begun over a grievance involving the four firefighters who had their pay docked.

The next bargaining session is scheduled for Jan. 2, with others set for February, March, and May.

Meanwhile, the elephant in the room is the question of whether firefighters use the sick time in order to work on other jobs.

Capello says that about half the force have second jobs.

"I'm a carpenter," Capello said.

Capello says the firefighters need the extra money to pay their bills. The average firefighter makes $63,985 per year, including stipends, education pay, nighttime differential, and health insurance. That figure does not include overtime.

Capello said firefighters do not abuse the sick-time policy in order to work their second jobs.

"All our members know, even our younger members, these sick days are very important to your life," he said. "They're not to be abused, not to be used inappropriately."

Cohen declined to comment on that issue.

Connie Paige can be reached at cpaige@globe.com.