Mayor seeks to add sweeteners to ordinance for cops

At Tuesday’s City Council work session, Mayor Kirk Watson added some details to the police pay and benefits ordinance that will be on this Thursday’s agenda. Council Member Ryan Alter authored the proposal in line with ideas Watson outlined on the City Council Message Board last week. Under that proposal, officers would not only continue to receive their current pay and benefits, but would also get a pay boost if the number of recruits reaches a certain number.

Watson stressed that all of his numbers were tentative and that he needed to discuss them with the city’s finance staff. First of all, he said, the current thought is that the ordinance “would increase the base wages by 4 percent.” In addition to giving officers higher pay, the ordinance would continue the authority of the Office of Police Oversight to review allegations of officer misconduct, including anonymous complaints.

The current contract expires March 31. Without the ordinance or another contract in place, rules regarding police benefits would be determined by state law.

Watson also seeks to add a provision not only to retain current police officers, but to encourage them to recruit others and to discourage their fellow officers from retiring or leaving the Austin Police Department. Watson said he envisioned officers receiving extra pay if a cadet class, for example, had 200 recruits. He said that might mean a 0.5 percent pay raise, but warned not to count on that number because he needed to discuss the matter with financial staff. Watson said all officers would get a pay bump with more officers joining the force.

Finally, Watson said he wanted to add a time limit to the ordinance, perhaps 12 months. He said Council could always revisit the ordinance, but he thought it was important to set a deadline so people would know it could not go on indefinitely.

The mayor then said, as he has in the past, that it is important to let the public weigh in on the two police oversight proposals on the May ballot. Those propositions, one sponsored by Equity Action and one largely paid for by the police union, would provide very different outcomes for officers. The ordinance was put forth by Ryan Alter, Watson, and Council members Alison Alter and José Velásquez. Council Member Leslie Pool asked Tuesday that her name be added to the list of sponsors.

Last week, Council Member Chito Vela sponsored a resolution directing staff to negotiate a one-year contract with the Austin Police Association. However, APA leadership rejected the idea of negotiating for just one year when they had reached a deal for a four-year contract with City Manager Spencer Cronk, who was subsequently fired. In his resolution, Vela said 250 officers currently eligible for retirement would face a Feb. 26 deadline to make important decisions about their retirement. The date added some urgency to the concept of the one-year contract.

However, a memo from Chief Financial Officer Ed Van Eenoo written Tuesday indicates that officers actually have more time to add to their deferred compensation plans than originally thought. He said for an officer whose last day on the job is between Feb. 24 and March 11, the deadline for completing all paperwork with Empower, the city’s deferred compensation plan manager, would be March 7. For an officer retiring between March 24 and April 8, the deadline for completing the paperwork would be March 4. However, if the ordinance proposed by Watson and Alter is approved this week, it should mean that retiring officers would not be under any deadline pressure.

Alison Alter said she was concerned about the appearance of coupling police oversight with granting raises. Watson denied that was the case, but said he wants APA to “get past this idea of total rejection of talking to the city anymore …. If they were to come to the table, there might be a way to address stability over time.”

The city reported in December 2022 that it had 1,577 officers and 249 operational vacancies. Even though major crime is down, a slight majority of respondents to the recent Notley/Monitor poll said there are not enough police officers in Austin.

The Austin Monitor’s work is made possible by donations from the community. Though our reporting covers donors from time to time, we are careful to keep business and editorial efforts separate while maintaining transparency. A complete list of donors is available here, and our code of ethics is explained here.