ANYONE WANT A PBA CONTRACT?

Anyone Want A PBA Contract?

After an Albany Supreme Court Justice denied the Bloomberg administration's bid to have its choice to chair a contract arbitration panel imposed on the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, city officials filed a motion to gain an expedited appeal of the ruling.

The question raised by that action is, does anybody here want to get a wage agreement in place for Police Officers in the near future?

Until now, the PBA has been the party delaying the process, and there is reason to believe claims by Bloomberg officials that the prime object is to ensure that no contract is in place until after the union's elections later this spring.

The union never responded to two separate contract offers put forward last May and June by Labor Relations Commissioner Jim Hanley whose prime feature was a significant increase in starting salary that would be funded by forcing future cops to accept reductions in the fringe benefits received by those already on the job.

And the union's balking at the inclusion on a list of potential arbitrators presented by the Public Employment Relations Board late last year of two who had ruled against the PBA a decade ago could not be viewed as a matter of principle. If it had been, then how to explain two previous arbitrations during PBA President Pat Lynch's tenure when those same arbitrators were part of the pool but the union lodged no objection, opting instead to choose someone else as the panel chairman?

Now, however, it is the city that is slowing the process and adding - if that's possible - to the acrimony between the two sides by appealing the ruling by Albany Supreme Court Justice Eugene Devine. He concluded that PERB is the rightful adjudicator in the battle over whether the city's designee as arbitration chairman, Arnold Zack, should be given that role on the grounds that the PBA defaulted from the process when it refused to take part in a final selection last Dec. 27.

City officials had maintained that the ground rules had been set by PERB's Director of Conciliation, Richard Curreri, and wanted him compelled to appoint Mr. Zack. If they lose their appeal, the decision will rest with the three recently chosen members of PERB, who are still awaiting official confirmation by the State Senate.

Ultimately, though, a greater concern for the Bloomberg administration than establishing if Mr. Curreri or the board members make the call on whether Mr. Zack should chair the arbitration panel is getting a contract in place to redress the $25,100 starting salary that Police Commissioner Ray Kelly has scalded as the primary obstacle to recruiting new cops. Even an expedited court appeal could further drag out the process and run the risk of the NYPD coming up short in recruiting for yet another police class because the pay scale hasn't moved back toward respectability.