Anchorage Daily News

Without any independent analysis, the Anchorage Assembly this week approved two labor contracts that are expected to increase city costs by nearly $30 million over their five-year terms.

In these economic times, such a superficial examination of such a huge commitment of the public's money is irresponsible. It's the kind of failed process that has plunged cities and states around the country into financial trouble.

We're not making a judgment on whether the contracts approved for the Anchorage Municipal Employees Association and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers are a good deal for the city -- we don't have enough information for that-- but we do have some concerns about them.

The point is that the Assembly approved them with inadequate public scrutiny. No critical examination. Not even a public work session.

You could say there was some urgency with these two contracts -- the AMEA contract expired in 2007, and the IBEW contract was up in October -- but that's not much of an excuse.

Soon the Assembly will consider two more union contracts, for police and fire, at its Dec. 16 meeting. Those contracts don't expire until the middle of next year. The internal audit director for the city has not even published the estimated additional cost of the two upcoming contracts yet.

There will be absolutely no excuse if the Assembly passes the next two labor contracts with the same lack of independent study.

To be fair, the Assembly was split in its decision, approving the IBEW and AMEA contracts in a 6-4 vote.

Those who voted in favor of the five-year contracts -- which include generous, across-the-board cost of living raises, on top of allowing a worker to move up the wage scale -- said they did so because there's a provision to suspend the raises and re-negotiate them in last three-to-four years of each contract.

Those who opposed the contracts mostly expressed concern that five years is too long a term for the contracts, given today's economic uncertainty. Some also questioned the administration's decision to offer what it calls "performance bonuses" of 6.5 percent, on top of annual cost of living raises. To get that "performance" bonus, all an employee has to do is meet safety and reliability standards and avoid being disciplined.

"If there were a shorter duration, I could probably go for it," said Assemblyman Dan Coffey, who voted no. "If a little more clarity were brought, that would have helped me too."

In defense of the contracts, city officials say they met the terms of an Assembly resolution passed in 2007. It told the Begich administration to seek wage increases that do not exceed average inflation rates, to eliminate costly and ineffective union work rules and to make employees share the rising cost of benefits.

Here are some questions the public was left with after the Assembly approved the deals:

• Can the city really afford to commit to annual cost of living raises that are a minimum of 2.5 percent, regardless of the city's actual financial condition?

• What is the full list of work rules that the city eliminated, and how much savings will result from them?

• How are employees shouldering a share of rising benefit costs?

• What is the anticipated cost of 6.5 percent performance bonuses and what value does the city get in return for them?

• How do these contracts compare to other government and private wages and benefits in Anchorage?

• Are five-year contracts appropriate with the mayor leaving office, the price of oil plummeting and the national economy mired in a deep recession?

The Assembly must wake up and do a much, much more thorough vetting of future contracts. At the very least, the Assembly should commission independent analyses of the upcoming contracts and review those analyses in detail in public. Approving them without that would constitute a dereliction of the Assembly's duty.

BOTTOM LINE: The Assembly failed us in letting two union contracts go through without a critical examination. It should not repeat the mistake with two upcoming contracts.

Lethal trap

Why on an Anchorage porch?

A bucket baited with meat. A trap strong enough to kill a dog.

This lethal combination was set on a porch in an Anchorage neighborhood south of Dimond, east of the Old Seward.

What do you conclude?

That whoever set this Conibear trap intended to lure an animal onto the porch and kill it. Probably a dog or cat from the neighborhood -- unless an invasion of rabid wolverines somehow slipped under the radar.

Well, the trap worked, and it killed a much-loved family and neighborhood dog for no good reason. We'll let the police figure out who's responsible and whether a crime was committed.

But why in heaven's name would anyone leave a deadly trap set on a porch in Anchorage? Alaskans know that you treat a trap like a firearm. It's not a toy. You should no more leave a set trap on the front porch than you'd leave a loaded gun.

Such traps have no business anywhere in the city, not near well-used trails and certainly not on a neighborhood porch.

BOTTOM LINE: Front-porch trapping in Dimond neighborhood is an outrage.

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