Have you seen this truck?
A reader sent the below picture to my editor after the Sunday overtime story ran, and my editor asked me to put it on the blog:
The reader didn't want his name used (surprise!) but said he took the photo on Nov. 2 in the afternoon, and made the obligatory "I guess city workers can go shopping during the day time" critique.
I sent the photo to city CAO Dave Montgomery and asked for city policy on using company vehicles during work time. His response (paraphrasing here):
1) City employees out in the field get a lunch break, and if while they're out in the field they want to stop at a store or McDonalds, so be it so long as they don't abuse the policy and use the vehicle to run errands before/during/after work. (Think about it -- let's say a city worker is up on the far west side of the city working on something and using a city vehicle and comes to a lunch break. Do you want that worker to drive all the way back to their car, go to lunch, then take the city vehicle and gas and go all the way back to the work site?)
2) The truck appears to be from parks and rec truck, or street maintenance. In either case, Montgomery said, city employees do at times need to stop at Gander Mountain and purchase items from that store (though they're not shopping in Duluth! Oh noes!)
In either case, Montgomery said, use of the truck at that time seemed perfectly legitimate. And so there you go.
Posted by: Stahl on 3/12/2010 at 8:05 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink
Lessons of delayed gratification at the DECC
As Duluth and other cities once again approach the state legislature proffering their bonding bill wish lists, it's clear that many will walk away disappointed.
But occasionally, delay is not a bad thing, as the Duluth Entertainment Convention Center -- aka the DECC -- can attest.
Twice area legislators and community boosters approached the Legislature with plans for a new DECC hockey arena, only to have their proposal shot down. But as cliché would have it, the third time proved a charm in more ways than one.
The efforts of project's plucky supporters finally paid off in the form of bond financing, and a new arena should be ready for action this December.
Delaying a construction project usually adds to its cost, thanks to the forces of inflation. However, delay in the face of recession can have the opposite effect.
"By fate, we put our project out for bid at the worst time for the building trades, but it was the best time for us, in terms of value," said Dan Russell, the DECC's executive director.
He estimates the project's timing -- a product of dumb although welcome luck -- increased the DECC's buying power by $10 million to $15 million. Builders, hungry for work, competed fiercely for the job, driving down the cost.
With work in short supply, the DECC also benefited in another way. Russell noted that contractors were eager to keep their best employees on the job, and hence they brought their A-teams to work on the arena.
Even building supplies became cheaper in the face of the economic downturn, as demand for steel and other commodities waned during a time when many projects were placed on hold.
Take, for instance, the 72,000 feet of steel piling upon which the new arena is being constructed. The DECC paid $26 per foot of piling on the arena -- half of what it would have spent six months earlier. That's a savings right there alone of nearly $1.9 million.
It was largely as a result of the DECC being able to stretch its dollars further, that Duluth will end up with such a top-of-the-line upgraded facility. Think of that, as you settle into your new and wider seat for some Bulldog hockey on home ice next season.
And while we would gladly trade the recession in for some good old-fashioned inflation right now. The DECC arena project demonstrates that sometimes it does pay to wait.
Posted by: Peter Passi on 3/11/2010 at 11:30 AM | Comments (5) | Permalink
Tags: business, buzz, construction, decc, duluth, hockey, politics
The anecdote
So, as I've written, the mayor wouldn't comment on the Sunday city overtime story, but he at least apparently read the piece, as indicated during a speech given Tuesday at a Chamber of Commerce luncheon at the Kitchi Gammi Club. Editorial page editor Chuck Frederick, who was there, explains:
Ness talked about being out with his daughter last weekend, visiting the Depot, attending a birthday party and running other errands. That's when the little girl noticed rust had eaten a hole into their car.
The little girl then noticed the old car smelled kind of funny, too, Ness said, continuing the story. She said it was time they get a new car.
The mayor explained as best as he could that the old one was still a good runner, that new cars are expensive and that they just couldn't afford a new one right now.
His daughter came back with one of the toughest questions a young father faces: "Why?"
"I said the only thing I could think of after reading the News Tribune," Ness said. "I said, 'Well, honey, I'm not a utilities operator.' "
Posted by: Stahl on 3/11/2010 at 8:04 AM | Comments (23) | Permalink
Tags: city overtime, don ness
The cutting room floor: City OT edition
Sometimes my editor has to act like a bartender and just cut me off. Whenever I get going on a good feature story like the city overtime piece that ran Sunday, I typically write way, way longer than any one expects and the paper has the amount of space needed to publish. So, she says "I think you've had enough," and calls me a cab, and usually in a drunken stupor I give the cab driver the wrong address and end up somewhere in suburban Minneapolis.
At any rate, that's what happened with the story Sunday (except this time I ended up in Alabama of all places). I could have written twice as much. There were so many angles to take with the story, so much that I didn't write about and/or didn't have the time to explore (though some readers and city employees have taken me to task for not doing so). But as I've said before, that's why god created blogs. So what else would I have liked to include/expand on?
That many of the employees getting hundreds of hours of overtime aren't on emergency call.
Look at that chart again of the top 25 city workers that get the most OT. Yes, the majority of them seemed to be getting the standby duty/were on call (and when your water main breaks/furnace goes out, you want someone to respond -- though we can disagree about how much they get paid to do so), but there are some employees in there that you see like "information specialist", "warehouse specialist", "mechanic" getting lots of OT. And below the 500-hour threshold I used you see many non-emergency workers getting 400 plus hours of overtime. Why? What's going on there? I don't know -- I didn't have the time to get into it. Maybe city workers reading this blog could chime in.
That other cities see OT spending when compared to Duluth largely reversed
I looked at data from Superior, Rochester, St. Cloud, Minneapolis and St. Paul. In each city, public works usually came in around last when it came to overtime spending, while police and fire came in generally first and second. I don't think the public would mind it too much if police officers were getting large amounts of overtime -- we assume it's going to public safety, etc. We do mind when that spending is reversed. And we do raise eyebrows when salaries of city workers reach private-sector like levels or are out of line with other cities. The salary of Daniel Jazdzewski, for example, would have made him the highest paid non management public works employee in either St. Paul or Minneapolis.
That the standby provisions may not be all that abnormal when it comes to unionized city workers.
To get an idea of what the common practice is for overtime/standby use for city workers, I called Laura Kushner, human resources director with the League of Minnesota Cities. She said some of the standby pay and provisions are state and federally mandated, such as any over time worked has to be time and a half. She looked through Article 18.1 in the city contract that outlines the standby provisions in contract language gobblygook. Her response when she looked at the contract?
"Duluth’s standby pay (2 hours at time and one-half) is not the highest rate out there. It varies from some cities that pay nothing for standby to others that pay hour for hour at straight time. Many are in the middle, like Duluth, paying from 1-3 hours of pay at time and one-half for each shift on standby."
So, we're in the middle. But as to why public works employees were getting more OT when compared to other cities, she didn't know.
That maybe the city is saving money by spending on OT.
Mad about a city worker getting $123k+? Fine, there's a way to reduce that salary, and that's by hiring more workers. But you have to pay those workers salaries/benefits/retirement//retiree health care/standby time, too. I would think someone within the city has done a cost benefit analysis on this, I just didn't time to find out 1) if that has happened and 2) go through the hassles of determining if it's public data and getting it.
That firefighters have largely dropped off the huge OT earners list.
I have OT data dating back to 2006 or so, and firefighters used to take a big chunk of the hours/money. But 2009 was different -- aside from a few assistant chiefs, they're not getting the hours and overtime dollars like they used to. So what's going on? Out of the kindness and goodness of their hearts, did these guys suddenly take a massive pay cut, or is this salary coming in from another channel? Again, I don't know -- another area I didn't have time to look at. But firefighters and city workers, your comments would be appreciated.
That the city is going to get hit hard when these high OT earners retire.
Someone wrote and asked why I didn't look into that. Actually, I wanted to, as it was a point brought up by councilor Todd Fedora when I was interviewing him. To calculate government pensions, the state uses a "high five" system -- the highest five years of an employee's salary. How much will these pensions cost the city in the future? I don't know. Would make for a good follow-up story, though. Just don't tell the fine folks at WDIO.
That 2009 wasn't suddenly the first time public works employees earned high amounts of overtime.
The standby provisions in the contract have been in place for years. Heck, former DNT reporter Scott Thistle did a story about this in 2006. He wrote, "[In 2005], a single utility worker in the Public Works Department boosted his $58,000 annual salary with more than $38,000 in overtime pay." I don't have the data he used, but if that's his high example, it does seem like those salaries and OT costs have gone up for a few.
The Bergson administration did apparently try to reduce some of the provisions in the contract.
According to former city chief administrative officer John Hall, standby and seniority were areas of the contract he was trying to change during the negotiations for the 2007-09 contract. One example he brought up was that when a crew was out working on a line break or whatever and their shift was ending the provision that senior workers needed to be called and offered the overtime to continue the work. He thought the crew on site should be allowed to keep going, he said.
The contract, he said, "evolved to the point where it restricted management's ability to manage and control costs." He said he wanted to change that. He got a big fight.
"That's what AFSCME was picketing on the steps of city hall about," he said. "I was willing to take it to a strike."
He said then mayor Herb Bergson was willing to go there too, but then he lost his re-election bid. Then the incoming "administration" as Hall calls it -- meaning Don Ness, though he wouldn't say him by name -- asked the Bergson administration to back down and settle the dispute without a strike.
"If there had been more political integrity in the waning weeks of 2007, these issues would have been resolved," he said.
Ness wouldn't comment for the story, so I'll wager a few guesses as to his response. Based on my past conversations with Ness and current CAO David Montgomery, they are no fans of the OT, with Ness making it a point when he came into office to reduce it where/when possible (the state auditor even took the city off the naughtly list last year, though that may change). And I imagine coming into your administration with a striking work force would have been a bit of a disaster, so I can see why Ness asked that he and whoever he hired as his CAO be given a relatively clean slate when he entered office. And I can see why he'd want to do a one year contract with some minor changes (though obviously the union disagreed that they were minor) and get to the big stuff for 2011. And I think that will happen, because now the public will be behind the administration in its efforts.
That no one from the city contacted me asking me to do this story.
But thanks for your question, city conspiracy theorist. I have the salary data from 2006 to 08 thanks largely to the state auditor reports on the city, which I get late in the year and makes a story seem a bit dated. I finally decided to do what I could to request the 2009 data from the city, which they gave me within a week or two of the request.
Suddenly I've written a blog post probably as long as my initial story.
I know, right? See what I mean?
That the city's infrastructure is apparently falling apart.
Number of water main breaks in 1990, according to the city of Duluth: 45. Number in 2009: 106. And that was a good year. In 2008 the number of breaks was 146, in 2007 it was 163.
Which makes me sorta wonder about the city's program requiring homeowners to fix their private sewer lines to reduce sanitary sewer overflows. Is it fair to be asking a selection of 175-or-so homeowners each year to pay so much to fix its lines when the city apparently has miles of it in disrepair? And I guess technically we do pay for those repairs, too.
That I want city workers to comment anonymously on this story.
I've gotten lots of (anonymous) messages from employees at Garfield and City Hall loathing and praising my story, respectively. There seems to be a division there -- but I'm limited as to what I can write because the information I have is anonymous or for background. So if you work at the city, what do you think? We didn't have online comments for the main story, so here's your chance to speak out now.
Posted by: Stahl on 3/08/2010 at 2:42 PM | Comments (76) | Permalink
Tags: city overtime
Negotiations hangover
Sure, the city of Duluth and AFSCME Local 66 reached a tentative contract agreement last week, averting a threatened strike by 461 city employees. But that doesn't mean everyone on the city council is singing "Kum ba yah."
At the end of a council agenda session meeting last Thursday, Councilor Kerry Gauthier took the city administration to task for not actively engaging in negotiations earlier and for hiring an out-of-town attorney to lead those efforts. He suggested the $50,000 in payments authorized to pay this attorney could have been better spent.
"I'd like to look at how we do negotiations," said Gauthier. "It seems to me that adopting an adversarial relationship doesn't help workers, doesn't help the city and doesn't help the administration."
Councilor Sharla Gardner seconded Gauthier and said she was tired of hearing city employees repeatedly demonized.
"In recent years, there has been a trend in some parts of our community to blame city workers for everything that has gone wrong for the last 25 years," she said. "It has been a pretty successful campaign, but I would like to see it stopped," she said.
Gardner said city employees deserve respect, especially as their numbers dwindle and workers shoulder more duties. She commended the city's administration for successfully negotiating a contract with AFSCME Local 66 and averting a strike.
But Councilor Jay Fosle suggested AFSCME has been just as guilty of incivility. Following comments he made on this blog about the mayor needing to prepare for a possible strike, including the possibility of hiring replacement workers, Fosle said he was subjected to a bit of intimidation.
"I was told to watch my back, and I didn't appreciate that," he said, referring to the comments as "uncalled for, to say the least."
Fosle said he found the threat even more ironic as the only sitting councilor still active in a union. Fosle, a school mechanic, belongs to the National Conference of Firemen and Oilers Local 956.
Councilor Todd Fedora also rushed to the defense of the city's administration, asking a reluctant David Montgomery, the city of Duluth's chief administrative officer, to describe his sense of fiduciary responsibility to the community.
After the meeting, Fedora was critical of Gauthier's comments, saying: "That type of armchair quarterbacking was uncalled for, especially when efforts were being made to calm the situation."
It sounds like the council may need a little time to stand down on this issue. Stay tuned to see if recent contract negotiations with the city of Duluth's largest union re-emerge as a topic of discussion when the council meets tonight.
Posted by: Peter Passi on 3/08/2010 at 9:30 AM | Comments (11) | Permalink
Tags: afscme, buzz, city council, duluth
They get letters
Like I said yesterday: working on a big story, not much time to blog, blah blah blah, so let's go the easy route and publish some emails recently sent to the Duluth City Council, starting with one in support of the Seaway:
>>> Laurie Mattson <lsdm13@gmail.com> 3/4/2010 12:23 AM >>>
Hello there! Happy 'Almost' Spring!
I have such a need to share some things with all of you. I befriended Michael Nacey, the manager of the Seaway Hotel, a couple of years ago. I was so impressed with him, his life story and commitment to changing the West End of Duluth, that I suggested a story be written about him. The Living Stones newspaper, a free local Christian publication, did a feature story on him. It was sent to most Midwest States, and chosen to be printed in Spanish and sent to west coast states. He is, quite honestly, one of the truest human beings I have met. I am a life long Duluthian, and have worked in reputable jobs at the Duluth Clinic, as a security officer for the EPA in Duluth, and had my own variety band for years. I have a heart for people and find the best in everyone. I volunteer by helping Safe Haven shelter, CHUM, the Skyline Parkway group, and try my darndest to do kindnesses each day. It's needed during these times we find ourselves in.The reason I am writing about Michael, is that he is trying to help the Seaway Hotel and it's residents, to find a better way of life and of dealing with the situations they are in. I went to see him today to bring toys for some children, and to see him interact with concern and piety to the people who came through the door, was an awesome thing! He even has a small ministry next door to the hotel, but water damage from the roof has forced it to close for now. He has Bible study for those who want it. He reaches out to people...by picking them up in his van and brings them to church. Michael knows where these folks are at..he is a recovered addict. He was at his lowest and decided to pick himself up. Now he finds himself where he says God put him.
I'm not sending this to "preach", but to ask you all to please consider helping this hotel in some shape or form. When I was there today, I spent an hour at the front desk. Never once did I feel threatened, or uneasy. People came and went...a gentleman who lived there looked as though he had a tough life, but bought me a 30 cent cup of coffee. Michael does it all and with a smile and a calmness that is rare to see. His nephew, Rick Caya, owns the Seaway. I don't know him. I can't imagine the struggle the place faces, and so many people would be left homeless if it closed. We have enough homelessness now. If anyone wants to come and meet Michael and have a chat with him, I would be happy to go with you. I'm just one person, who wishes to have monetary wealth..not for me, but to help people in this wonderful city. It is a noble city, and one of unmatched scenic beauty. Duluth needs to be on the map for how it takes care of its' own.
Thanks for your time, and God Bless!
Laurie Mattson
Next, a resident wants to know what to do with a neighbor's crummy fence. Suggestions?
Greetings!
I would like to know if there are any city regulations pertaining to fences on homeowners property. I reside at 2218 W. 8th Street and the house to the west of me has a flimsy green snow fence on metal poles. It constantly blows in the wind, is tied on with string, and frequently falls down. Please let me know if this violates any city law or ordinance. It is, to say the least, quite an eyesore. Please respond at your convenience.
Thank You,
Jeffrey A. Mendelson
2218 W. 8th Street
And finally, citizen journalist/blogger/cab driver John Ramos sent this to the council:
>>> <thecheerleader@shiningreputation.com> 3/3/2010 5:14 PM >>>
Did you know that Spirit Mountain is funding the alpine coaster by raiding their repair and replacement budget, in violation of a 2003 agreement with the city?
http://shiningreputation.com/blog/?p=434#more-434
J. Ramos
I'll let you read through Ramos' post, and I have no idea if what he claims is true, but suffice to say that there's enough good information there to prompt the DNT to do its own reporting (though I don't know when/if we'll be coming out with a story).
But I will say this: if it's true that Ramos has been treated in the manner he has by the Spirit Mountain board, that the chair of the board actually said to him regarding giving him public data they would only do "the minimum" required and told him to bring his own copy machine to get public documents, that doesn't speak well of the board. It makes it look like they have something to hide, and when there is that appearance it causes skeptics like Ramos to dig and push harder. The people on the board have been around long enough to know this, so it's strange to me that they would treat him that way. Yes, in their eyes he may well be a pain in the rear end to deal with, and from their point of view he may have written things that they believe to be factually incorrect. That does not mean you should stall and treat him like a sub-standard citizen when he requests public information. In fact, the opposite is true: someone from Spirit Mountain should have set up time with him away from the meetings to better explain the board's positions and go over the documents with him.
But then, I have a bias: Spirit Mountain is run partially through tax dollars, and therefore I believe should be as transparent as possible. In this case, it appears that they have not been.
Posted by: Stahl on 3/05/2010 at 8:26 AM | Comments (7) | Permalink
Tags: emails to the council, spirit mountain
I get letters
An email sent to me regarding my "Background check for Santa Claus" story:
Email: SantaClaus@USA.net
Name: Santa Claus
Phone: 775-833-5500
City: Lake Tahoe
State: NVPublish? Yes
Subject: Re: Santa Claus Fingerprinting
Message:
Hi, Brandon: I read your piece about your local Santa having to be fingerprinted. My legal name is Santa Claus, and I'm a full-time volunteer child advocate at Lake Tahoe in Nevada. I think it's a good idea for all folks who 'play' Santa to be fingerprinted well in advance of their first annual appearance. I'm surprised that your community is beginning it's Christmas celebration before Thanksgiving. I'm a Christian Monk, as St. Nicholas was many centuries ago, and believe that Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Christ, not the crass, commercial, secular spectacle it has become in many places, and that the greatest gift one can give is love, not presents. I invite your readers to visit TheSantaClausFoundation dot org to learn about the plight of millions of children in the U.S. annually who are abused, neglected, exploited, abandoned, homeless, and institutionalized through no fault of their own. Blessings to all, Santa Claus
Posted by: Stahl on 3/04/2010 at 10:54 AM | Comments (9) | Permalink
Tags: bentleyville
Hodgepodge
I'm working on a bigger-than-normal Sunday story (which should actually be pretty good), so won't be able to blog too much the next two days. That means it's miscellanious stuff time!
First up: About three years ago I did a story about a church in West Duluth that was importing slaves from Africa. No, really! They were bringing in people who thought they would be seminary students, but these church "monks" really just wanted them to clean their church and help them run a fake medical school. After I did the story the church was sold after and the "monks" just sort of ... went away. But they've resurfaced in the one state in the country it would be safe for them ... Ohio. They apparently bought a crummy old motel where they'll be running their "church" and "school" and might be using homeless people to do their work.
From the story:
“Right now we also have an outreach program to homeless men who work for a place to stay,” Bishop Timothy said. “We’re using that money to supplement our income until our renovation in the spring.”
Good times!
When I blogged about the town of Topeka changing its name to "Google" I wrote "ball's in your court, Mayor Ness." And take the ball and run with it he did, making this YouTube response.
Finally, if you're interested in taking a look at the Bentleyville contract that requires a background check for Santa, and a legal mandate that he be jolly, here it is.
Posted by: Stahl on 3/04/2010 at 8:21 AM | Comments (5) | Permalink
Tags: bentleyville, google fiber
The Google-Twin Ports FAQ
Let's take a break from all things AFSCME and talk about Google. I've had a few questions about the entire "bring fiber to Duluth" process and so was put in touch with Christopher Swanson, the CEO of PureDriven, a Two Harbors-based Web traffic building company, and who is also the project manager for bringing Google to Duluth, and was willing to walk me through some of my queries.
How many other communities/cities are we competing with for Google Fiber? Is Duluth a finalist for the fiber?
It's tough to say. The short answer: LOTS. Google has opened up applications to all cities across the country, and if you do a Google News search you'll find cities like Palo Alto, San Francisco, St. Louis, Grand Rapids (Michigan), Baltimore and numerous others trying to get the company's attention.
"Duluth is competing against any other city," Swanson said.
Is there any suggestion from Google that Duluth is a finalist?
Google has not said it's doing anything like picking a list of 100 cities and narrowing it down to a select few to choose the winner, Swanson said. But, he said, "Duluth continues to lead in terms of amount of project involvement."
How so?
The Twin Ports/Google Facebook page, he said, "is up in terms of the number of people that are fans." As of this writing, there are about 6,172 members.
Swanson also said he's also tracking hits on the TwinPorts Google page, and the number of YouTube videos made, which have also been high, compared to other cities he said he's tracking. (Though I only found a couple of YouTube videos when searching Google + Twin Ports.)
What other cities is Swanson tracking that have put a major effort into the initiative? And how many facebook fans/members do those cities have?
He named four: Baltimore (1,633), Seattle (263? Not sure I found the right one), Lafayette, Louisiana (93), and Topeka, Kan. (10,700 fans! Oh noes!). Topeka apparently just changed its name during March to "Google." Ball's in your court, Mayor Ness!
Here's a search result in Facebook when I entered Google Fiber. It's probably meaningless, but another Google Fiber/Twin Ports page comes up first.
So are we pinning our hopes on a Facebook page?
No, ultimately it's the application that matters and the number of people who nominate Duluth. We're presuming that Google just wants to see overwhelming public support for the project, and Facebook is just one way of showing that support. Also: I came up with that answer all by myself.
We're in the middle of nowhere Minnesota with a population of less than 100,000 people, why in the world would Google possibly pick Duluth/Superior?
"We're an awesome fit for the requirements Google put forward," Swanson said. "We fit the parameters really well."
First, he said: the population Google is looking for a population of 50,000 to 500,000. That's us!
Second, he said: we produce entreprenuers, many of whom want to start a technology-related businesses.
Third, he said: we have a skilled workforce and people that can promote all of our community's assets.
Yeah, but when it's all said and done, other communities have the same things. So what in the application will make Duluth stand out?
"What makes Duluth stand out in general. It's a beautiful place to live," Swanson said. "And a beautiful place to be."
The mayor had a really compelling argument for why Duluth should the fiber at the kick-off event two weeks ago, and like an idiot I didn't record it. I asked him to write something up, and here's what he sent:
"Duluth is a city of choice - talented and creative people want to live here. The sort of people who create the next big innovation would love to live in a city with such a strong, authentic sense of place. Duluth has been held back from reaching our potential, in large part, by our physical proximity to the hub of commerce in this country. Google Fiber is the great equalizer - the tool that will allow the world-class talent right here in Duluth, Minnesota to compete with the world.
My goal is to make sure that Google fiber experiment is a grand and unqualified success story because they chose Duluth.
Duluth seems to be an excellent fit for the criteria that Google is presenting. We want to show our enthusiasm, not only for the tool itself, but more importantly the possibilities to create, innovate, and promote open source principles throughout our day to day lives.
The response of our community has been outstanding! We have got great participation from entrepreneurs, to students, to executives, to average residents, and of course a healthy dose of geeks. We've been following the action around the country and I believe that we have the strongest grassroots campaign anywhere!"
Will the conflict between the city and union impact the efforts to bring Google fiber here?
Says the mayor: "no, it has no impact."
Well, ok then.
OK, so why should I care if Google is bringing high-speed internet to a community?
"It's like getting electricity first," Swanson said. "Or the railroad first. It's that big."
Why?
"Because the quicker you can get it, the quicker you can start developing applications around the fiber," Swanson said.
And how fast are we talking here? And where would it go?
Apparently the speed to download a movie in a matter of seconds -- 100 times faster than cable internet -- and installed into every home and business in the target area. And competitively priced, according to Google, with other internet service providers.
If Duluth does get the fiber, how much will it cost?
That's anybody's guess, Swanson said, but he's guessing "close to $100 million."
And who's paying for that?
"Google will pay the whole thing," Swanson said.
Suddenly I'm excited to get this in Duluth. When is the application to Google due, and how can I help?
The application is due on March 26, and you can help by registering with the Google Twin Ports page, and a friendly person I'm sure will get back to you.
Any other questions? Feel free to ask and I'll try to get answers.
Posted by: Stahl on 3/02/2010 at 8:32 AM | Comments (27) | Permalink
Tags: google fiber
The replacements
I called all nine city councilors (was unable to reach one) and posed the following hypothetical: if AFSCME goes on strike, and the mayor hires replacement workers (aka scabs), what would your reaction be? Their reactions, starting in alphabetical order (also, I should note that I cut out the parts where almost each and every councilor said something to the effect of "whoo boy, sure hope that doesn't happen!" I tried to get to the heart of whether they would be in favor of such an occurance):
Jeff Anderson:
"I would be oppose. ... from everything I've heard and everything I know the administration and AFSCME are not far away from a deal and I think they should be back at the table rather than preparing for the possibility of a strike."
[NOTE: I asked if it isn't reasonable for the city to be preparing for a strike in case one happens. He said yes, but added "I think there's a difference between thinking about what's next and being back at the table."
Tony Cuneo:
"It's hard to know how I feel about everything when I don't know what the contract looks like ... if it does get that far, and if it happens, I guess I feel like I think it is related to the contract and related to the process at this point. Until I know more, it's hard to know how I would feel hypothetically about this situation. ... That's a hypothetical I don't want to deal with until I know more about the situation."
Todd Fedora:
"If the city is put in that difficult position, obviously its charged with the responsibility to get essential services completed. We cannot allow our streets to not be safe for our citizens because AFSCME wants to make a point with contract negotiations. ... if AFSCME goes on strike and we have a water main break, we can't do nothing."
Jay Fosle:
"If you have a huge snowstorm, you have to have someone plow the streets. You gotta do what you go gotta do, and I think the mayor looking to replace workers is just a reality. It's whatever he has to do. What are you going to do, shut the city down?"
(NOTE: While Fosle is in a union working with the school district, he said there is a no-strike clause in his contract).
Sharla Gardner:
"That would be in violation of the contract and an unfair labor practice, and the city would be leaving itself vulnerable to another lawsuit, which I think would be terrible. So I don't think that's the right way to go."
Kerry Gauthier:
"I wouldn't support replacement workers. That's operating on bad faith if you do that. I'd be more than vocal in my opposition."
[Note: Gauthier talked a bit about AFSCME workers being asked to accept more than other unions in concessions -- which I think both sides will agree is generally true, depending on how you define concessions -- and later suggested that the casino-generated Community Investment Trust fund should be tapped into to solve some of the city's budget woes.]
Dan Hartman:
"Obviously I think that would be a bad thing. There's an absolute benefit to having staff who have been there for years and know what they're doing... so if [replacement workers were hired] I would be very scared to see that happen."
[Note: Hartman later talked about not being informed of the entire situation, and not knowing what the city's plan would be should workers go on strike. "Maybe you should ask," I suggested.
"Good point," he replied.
Jim Stauber:
"Oh that's fine. City business has to be conducted. I believe as long as [Ness] has the right to hire replacement workers, I think there are a whole lot of people who would sign up for that work. ... we need to continue providing those services to the taxpayer. ... My committment isn't to the union, it's to the taxpayers of the city of Duluth. And they're paying plenty for those services."
Wasn't able to get ahold of: Jeff Anderson and Patrick Boyle.
I didn't ask the question trying to be an alarmist, because I honestly don't think the workers will strike. But I think it shows 1) the division on the council and 2) gives an insight into how tricky politically this is for Ness, at least long-term. Right now he has six councilors who generally see his way on most issues. But those same councilors are also loyal to the unions and stand by those principals. Which way will they side? For now, they're in the "let's get back to the negotiating table camp." But if push comes to shove and the workers go on strike, then what? I think the mayor has no choice but to hire replacement workers, right? But it says something to me that he won't answer the question if he will.
So if he does hire replacement workers, what kind of harm does that do to his political future? Short-term, it helps him, I think. He gets re-elected going away, as I think the public is squarely against AFSCME on this one. But any DFLer with long-term political aspirations almost always needs union support because of the amount of money and energy labor PACs spend in the elections. I'm in no way suggesting that Ness is thinking about his political future in all of this (and I'm sure that I'm even writing about this is cheesing-him off), but if Ness hires replacement workers, doesn't the possibility of any future union support end? Or am I being naive and it's ended already?
Posted by: Stahl on 3/01/2010 at 8:26 AM | Comments (30) | Permalink
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