The City of Marysville and local firefighters’ union are in the middle of a dispute involving overtime.
“They are grieving how they are paid overtime,” said Marysville City Administrator Terry Emery.
City Council recently transferred more than $20,150 from a variety of funds in the fire department’s budget into the department’s technical services budget.
Emery stressed that it is an “internal transfer within the fire department budget.”
“The money is there, I just want to make that clear,” Emery said. “We are just asking to move those.”
In September, the International Firefighters Association (IAFF) Local 3032, the union which represents Marysville firefighters, filed a grievance with Fire Chief Jay Riley.
The dispute centers around the way overtime is paid. Riley said Marysville fire fighters work a 24-hour shift, then have 48 hours off. He said the firefighters are paid based on a 106-hour, two-week pay cycle. He said schedule has firefighters working five days over the two-week period.
“We have been doing it the way we have been doing it for twenty plus years,” Riley said, noting that it is “very typical for fire fighters to have the 53-hour work week.”
City officials say they believe this is the work and payment schedule that has been negotiated with the union.
The union, Riley explained, is arguing that it should be paid based on a 40-hour work week. Additionally, union officials also contended that firefighters should receive overtime pay anytime they work that is not part of their regular shift.
Riley said most city fire fighters are paid $28.63 per hour and overtime is paid at $42.95.
Riley examined the case and ruled against the union, which then appealed to the city manager as the next step. Emery also ruled against the union citing past-practice regarding overtime pay.
“We are holding our ground on this,” Emery told city council.
The union and city decided to take the grievance to arbitration. Riley called it a “joint decision.”
“We feel it is probably in our best interest to use some legal assistance in this,” Emery said, noting his intention to hire Jonathan Downes of Zashin and Rich from Columbus.
Riley said the union will also have an attorney. He said the two sides will work to find an arbitrator they can both agree on.
“They always look to see if there is a way to meet in the middle,” Riley said.
He said he does not have much hope for a middle ground because, “we are pretty far apart.”
The fire chief said the city is “still trying to run that number,” to see what the city could owe the fire fighters for past and future work.
“It would be so significant that we went with outside council,” Riley said.
He added that if the union prevails, firefighters could receive adjusted pay back to August, “so it would not be retro (active) for years.”
Riley also told council that based on the contract with the union, the losing party will be responsible for both side’s legal fees.
He did say that while the grievance will not be decided as part of upcoming labor negotiations in 2022, overtime rules will be spelled out clearly in the next contract.
He added that by the time those negotiations are finalized, the overtime problem should be minimized as council has approved the hiring of three additional firefighters.
Riley and Emery said the negotiations have been “a good process.”
“I don’t think there is any animosity or hard feelings at all between the union and administration,” Riley said.
“We will still work closely with our firefighters’ union to get this taken care of the right way,” Emery said.
Parker Robison, union president, said he did not want to talk about the grievance until the matter had been resolved.
“At this point, we are still going through the process,” Robison said.