MANSFIELD — An arbitrator may ultimately decide what the “me too” clause means in the labor contract between the City of Mansfield and AFSCME Local 3088.
It seems clear after one year the city administration and union leaders do not agree on the definition of the words in the contract the two sides agreed on in September 2021.
Roberta Skok, regional director of Ohio Council 8 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, implored City Council on Tuesday evening to get involved in the negotiations.
“Don’t waste the taxpayers’ money on attorney fees and arbitration fees,” Skok said. “A city employee is a city employee. (It) doesn’t matter if you’re police, fire or collecting payments or working in the street department. We all need to be treated the same.”
Her comments came on the same night Council approved new labor agreements with members of both units of the Mansfield Fraternal of Police William Taylor Lodge 32. One unit represents patrol officers and the other represents supervisors.
Those contracts included an immediate 7.75-percent pay increase that local lawmakers already approved in March 2022 through a memorandum of understanding.
Total FOP pay increases in the second and third years of the new deal were not announced on Tuesday. However, Skog said police officers will receive a total increase of 12.75 percent over the three-year contract.
Two weeks later, that agreement last March sparked local AFSCME leaders to tell council they were exercising the “me too” clause in their contract, which includes 8.5-percent pay increases during the three-year deal.
In February, City Council approved a new contract with its firefighters that implements 12-percent wage increases over the next three years.
Skok told council the “me too” clause in the 62-page contract means Local 3088 will receive the same wage benefits afforded other employees in collective bargaining agreements.
Members of the AFSCME Local 3088 include many of the “general laborers” that make the city run behind the scenes. They include motor equipment operators at the water and wastewater treatment plants; community development workers; snow plow operators; utility collectors; police records clerks and 9-1-1 communications workers; court clerks; water meter installers; Mansfield Lahm Regional Airport employees; maintenance workers; Clear Fork reservoir workers and employees at the parks department
“We have been working, labor and management, through some settlement talks and they’ve been going on for now over a year or right at a year,” Skok said. “To date, we don’t have an agreement. We have filed a request for arbitration. So we are moving forward to arbitration.”
She said the union is requesting an additional 4.25-percent in wage increases and the same bonus awards given to police and firefighters.
The “me too” clause is mentioned twice in the contract with AFSCME with differing language. Under Article 36 of the agreement, which deals with wages, it states:
“In the event that any other bargaining units with the City of Mansfield receives greater wage benefits, AFSCME Local 3088 will receive the same wage benefits effective on the same date as the other bargaining unit(s).”
Near the end of the AFSCME contract, which runs through April 2024, there is a section entitled “side letter reopener,” which states:
“In the event that another City bargaining unit receives a greater general wage increase (anything added to the base) for the concurrent period of their agreement than is provided for in this agreement, the Union may request to reopen this agreement. Such reopening will be limited to the wage article only, with all other provisions of this Agreement remaining in full force and effect.”
Skok said FOP members and members of the International Association of Firefighters Local 266 both also received bonus payments paid for by a share of the city’s American Rescue Plan Act funds.
FOP members received $6,500 bonuses and firefighters received $6,000 bonus payments. Non-bargaining city employees received council approval for $4,000 bonus payments last month.
“AFSCME was the only one that had the ‘me too’ clause, yet the city has no settlement yet for us. The cost of moving this forward to arbitration is going to cost thousands of dollars by the time you pay for attorney fees and arbitrator fees,” Skok said.
Dave Remy, the city’s public works director and acting safety service director, said after the meeting the city has made “a number of different offers” to AFSCME in the last year.
“We have finally agreed that were at impasse and so it’s going to go through the arbitration process,” Remy said.
“There’s some different viewpoints about (the) interpretation of the ‘me too’ clause in the contract,” said Remy, the city’s former law director. “Because it does appear in the contract in two locations, in two different language.”
He said the city’s view is the clause doesn’t necessarily mean AFSCME is entitled to the exact same pay increases negotiated by other unions.
Remy also said the ARPA-funded bonuses were not included in the FOP or IAFF contracts.
Council approved the new contracts with the FOP after a 25-minute executive session used for “collective bargaining matters.” It’s the third straight council meeting that has included a closed-door session.
Local lawmakers had no public discussion on the new police contracts prior to the vote, nor did they respond to Skok’s remarks which came during the public participation portion of the meeting.
