Under an agreement announced last week by Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano, county police officers will get their first raise in nearly two years. In return, for the first time, new hires on the police force will have to contribute to their health care and pensions – just like you probably have to.
Thankfully this isn’t a done deal. The Nassau Interim Finance Authority, a state board placed in control of the county’s finances by the state Legislature, will have to agree to lift a wage freeze imposed in 2011 that reportedly saves the county more than $100 million a year. In addition, the county Legislature would have to sign off on the agreement.
The deal with the police will not benefit the other county employees who, for the most part, are paid considerably less and have also not gotten a raise in two years.
Without the raise, Nassau and Suffolk County police officers already have by far the highest entry-level pay of any police department in the region, including the Port Authority, MTA, state Troopers and the NYPD. With overtime and generous pay differentials for working the night shift, many county police officers are making more than $200,000 a year.
Last week NIFA officials told Newsday that they had not been told about the agreement.
How is it possible that the Mangano team didn’t think it was necessary to include NIFA in this discussion?
A NIFA board member said that for NIFA to lift the freeze, the county would have to match the $100 million that the agreement will cost in other savings.
Mangano said, “This plan creates structural savings for the county of hundreds of millions of dollars at no additional cost to the taxpayer.”
That’s the kind of malarkey and wishful thinking that led to NIFA begin given control of the county finances by the state in 2000.
Mangano said he struck the deal with the PBA in part because of a ruling by a U.S. District Court judge in February, which held NIFA no longer had the authority to suspend pay hikes and annual step increases. NIFA has appealed the ruling. If the ruling stands, the county could have to pay more than $230 million in retroactive wages.
The seven-member NIFA board, created by the state Legislature, took control of the county’s finances after it was determined that the county’s proposed budget would have run a projected deficit of more than $100 million, far more than the one percent necessary to trigger a control period.
If NIFA no longer has the power to stop the county from agreeing to pay raises that it cannot afford, then NIFA becomes powerless to save the county from massive tax increases and even potential bankruptcy.
Mangano’s agreement with the police calls for the kind of spending that got the county in trouble in the first place. Is it really necessary that the police in Nassau County make nearly twice what members of the NYPD in comparable ranks make?
How will Mangano justify giving retroactive pay raises to police and not the other county employees?
Until now, all county workers have had to bite the bullet. The county Legislature should think twice about signing onto this and NIFA should stand its ground.
We have the greatest respect for the men and women of the Nassau County Police Department, but we’re not convinced that the county can afford to give them a raise.
If Mangano, who just happens to be in a close race for re-election, can’t prove that the county can afford this deal, then it should be rejected.
