Elections bring new hope
Dear MB Residents,
Of all the articles we have written and published, this one is the most difficult because up until now, we believed there were a few Council Members who believed in the basic principle that We The People tell the government what to do, not the other way around.
At one time, that principle may have motivated some of our Councilmembers to run for Office. But serving in a position of power can change people, and it’s our observation that our Councilmembers have forgotten they serve and represent the voice of the people, not themselves.
When it comes to the big issues, our elected officials became “politicians” and residents have been ignored, forgotten, and betrayed.
Just in the 2 years that we have been watching and reporting on issues, we’ve seen Council push their will on the residents in the way they chose to handle the Bruce’s Beach issue, keeping HighRose under wraps and away from public knowledge for 10 months, and now imposing a one-sided contract on our Firefighters after misleading residents about the overtime and reneging on their statement of compromise. Based on our observations, it appears that all 5 Councilmembers have become complicit in all of the above.
But MB residents should not be discouraged. These types of problems tend to get resolved with a good old fashion election.
Council’s Firefighter Fiasco
Council’s own report reveals that it was never about the OT.
The insignificant savings after imposing their contract on the Firefighters, along with ignoring reasonable compromises recommended by a neutral third party leads one to conclude that Councilmembers and City Manager, Bruce Moe, used the OT issue as a false narrative to gain public support to force their contract on our Firefighters.
Some residents saw this sooner than others, and we thank those for following this story and assisting us when needed.
How do you rally support for yourself, when you intend to place punishing employment restrictions on the Firefighters who the community loves? Answer: accuse the Firefighters of being a hardened “union” and gaming the overtime system at taxpayer expense, then paint yourself as the hero with the solution. That is what Bruce Moe and City Council have been doing for the last 2 years, whether they all were aware of the sham or not.
But not all residents were buying into the narrative, so the City took it a step further and posted/circulated the pay information of some Firefighters of $500,000/year. That poured fuel on the fire to create animosity toward our Firefighters. It worked on some residents, but others simply didn’t like the public attacks on the Firefighters by our elected Officials. When Measure A was defeated, the #2 reason was because of the unkind public attacks on residents by a few in the community.
By leaving out some key facts, the message from Council was deceptive:
First, every department in the City has a few employees that represent the department when their labor contracts are to be renewed. To characterize these few employees from the Fire Dept. as the “union” is to purposely paint them as unreasonable, power-hungry money grabbers. That is simply an untruth. No other Council has treated the Fire representatives like this.
Second, the City Mngr., Bruce Moe is directly responsible for the excessive OT in the Fire Dept. He has all departments running on OT. The Firefighters have no control over Bruce Moe’s management decisions for the Fire Dept, and Council has not been transparent with the residents about Bruce Moe’s role in the Fire Department’s OT.
Third, if the Firefighters were the "money grabbers” as Council painted them, they would have continued to earn the excessive OT and remained silent.
Fourth, Council’s employment contract for the Firefighters does NOTHING to solve the OT issue.
But at Tuesday night’s Council meeting, Council kept up the charade by stating their contract was going to “reset” the Fire Department and Councilmember Hadley added that Council needed to regain control of our Fire Department. However, Council’s contract does not reduce excessive OT, and the only control exercised is Council forcing harsh and demoralizing conditions on the Firefighters which the Firefighters have been fighting against in their 2-year negotiations.
Even after hundreds of residents pushed back on Council’s intentions to force restrictions on salaries, vacation time, sick leave, and other oppressive employment conditions that are not imposed on any other city department, Council voted 5-0 on Tuesday to force their contract on the Firefighters. A clear message was sent to all: we are in charge.
Council did not discuss or even bring attention to the meager savings their contract would bring. Many residents believed Council wanted to reel in the OT, why wouldn’t they believe their elected Officials? But the City’s Estimated Annual Cost/Savings schedule below reveals that saving on OT was never the mission.
After all of the forced cuts and changes to the Fire Department, the savings in OT is a meager $137,215 and the net savings overall is only $133,934!
See Council’s Estimated Annual Costs/Savings document below:
If Council was truly concerned about getting our City’s OT pay under control, Council would need to change the City’s practice of choosing to pay OT rather than hire more personnel and incur pension and benefit costs.
In 2020, Bruce Moe ran $2.4 million in OT in the Fire Department and $2.1 million in OT in the Police Dept. Councilmember Suzanne Hadley has been the most vocal in blaming the Firefighters for the excessive OT, however a simple search of the online payroll records at the Cal. State Controller’s office would provide this information to her and the other Councilmembers.
If the Councilmembers were not aware of the City’s OT practice, then there is a much bigger problem in how information is provided to Council by the City Manager’s office that needs addressing immediately.
However, before pointing fingers at the Firefighters, Councilmembers should have verified the information they were provided. That was a mistake and some would even say an unforced error.
But Councilmembers can redeem themselves from publically shaming our Firefighters and regain the public trust again by simply making another public announcement but this time, make it an apology. It’s the right thing to do.
Council’s actions reveal their stated interest in a fair compromise was insincere.
At the July 19th Council meeting, Mayor Napolitano read to the residents a prepared statement they “hope that a neutral (mediator) would move us closer to a fair and balanced agreement…”
However, during last Tuesday’s meeting, all Councilmembers kept silent about the neutral’s report and its recommendations for a fair and balanced compromise. Their silence avoided the need to explain why the recommendations were not incorporated into their contract.
Even the attorney hired by the City to negotiate with the Firefighters admitted during the Council meeting that the neutral party had successfully “split the parties’ differences,” meaning the recommendations by the mediator were “fair and balanced.” The neutral party’s report and recommendations are exactly what parties in a conflict expect from a mediator charged with the task to bring about an amicable resolution.
The Firefighters submitted a statement to Council earlier in the week stating they would accept and abide by the neutral’s recommendations for a compromise.
However, all 5 Councilmembers ignored the neutral’s report and reneged on their words from July to be willing to compromise to reach a fair and balanced contract.
This Council is slowly creating a crisis in public confidence.
When residents begin to ask themselves if there is any point in speaking up at Council or writing letters, or they express frustrations of not being heard by our elected Officials, it’s a symptom of a crisis in confidence of leadership.
Residents are experiencing this with the current School Board, which prompted 3 new faces to run for 3 open seats on the School Board. Collectively they are running to ensure residents are once again included in the decision making of our Schools. We are seeing the same problem occurring at our City Council; residents are not being included in the decisions that affect their lives and their family.
The public comments from the residents and the Firefighters were compelling at the Council meeting on Tuesday, yet with each passing speech, Councilmembers appeared more and more indifferent and the animus in the room grew.
Rudy Mejia, Firefighter/Paramedic, started the public comments by pleading Council to accept the neutral’s report, “Please, we need labor peace, please. We are working under your system and we are at work more than anyone else (in the city).”
Meija went on to explain that Hermosa Beach lost its Fire Dept. to LA County by the very same actions as he and the other Firefighters see going here in MB: overwork the Firefighters, run up the overtime, publically blame the Firefighters for the OT instead of holding the City Management responsible, and run off the crew with demoralizing and crushing employment restrictions that are not imposed on any other city department.
An LA County Firefighter who resides here in MB explained to Council the stress of the job, especially when there are poor management decisions coming from those in charge. She looked back to the room full of Firefighters and stated, “These are my brothers. A poor management decision from a corporation may cost the company profits but poor management decisions from our higher-ups can cost us our lives.”
In total, twenty-five individuals got up to speak to Council one at a time, many echoing the pleas of a compromise and some through tears of frustration over the feeling of not being heard. Others sounded fed up and disgusted with the appearance of Council’s stubbornness on this issue for over 2 years.
One long-time resident stated, “Take care of the people who take care of the citizens.” He went on to say that he thought how Council handled this conflict with the Firefighters was “shameful.”
Three candidates running for City Council attended the meeting and spoke on the issue:
Frank Chiella, President of the MB Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) got up to speak first and stated, “now is an opportunity for City Council to rebuild trust with the community.” That inspired others to repeat that challenge to Council throughout the night.
Rita Crabtree-Kampe, a co-founder of MB Safe, the community group overseeing the homeless in MB, asked Council to consider an agreement in the interest of resolving the contract dispute. Areas she thought Council could be flexible on included “vacation time and sick leave, which could be impactful to the mental health of the firefighters, which in turn could impact the residents. If Council reduces the paramedic pay, it could make MB less desirable for new hires.” She also asked Council to take time in considering the neutral’s recommendations and seek a compromise.
And former Councilmember Mark Burton gave a fiery speech, accusing Councilmembers of hurting the credibility of the City Council body as a whole. He stated, “You don’t fight the most important issues, but instead you fight the community.” Councilmember Montgomery later stated he thought Burton’s remarks were a “cheap shot” and took notice that Mr. Burton had left the room early.
Councilmembers gave their brief remarks, with the exception of Councilmember Hadley whose remarks we cover below. They voted 5-0 to force upon the Firefighters a contract that is one-sided, devoid of compromise, and punitive in nature.
Fire Captain, Dave Shenbaum, provided encouragement to his crew by stating, “Although this is a tough blow, we will get through this.”
Hadley went a bridge too far with her remarks.
On occasion, we get emails from residents and leaders accusing us of “going soft” on Councilmember Hadley. Other times, we receive emails from her voter base angry if they think she was not portrayed more “favorably.” To both sets of critics, we repeat a bit of our mission statement here.
We are committed to reporting on issues we think are crucial to the residents of MB, and sometimes it will include an elected Official. We will insert our opinion on occasion which is steeped in American values and principles of freedom and self-government. We always seek the truth and hold those in Office accountable to the truth (much to the disliking of some of our Leaders).
We have reported on Councilmember Hadley in a few past articles, particularly when she had the opportunity to turn over the task of researching and writing the Bruce’s Beach History Report to a professional firm that provides this service for municipalities (CC meeting, June 15, 2021).
Ms. Hadley was the deciding factor in the Council discussion and she decided against the idea. We think it was a vital mistake to allow an agenda-driven group of non-professionals to write an important piece of history that people with nefarious intentions want to manipulate and use against our community. As it currently stands, the Report has included several false rumors, stated as fact, and there is no disclaimer stating that the conclusions of the Report are tentative and not definitive to protect the city in future lawsuits.
Sometimes one voice on Council can make a difference. This was one of those critical moments in time where her voice was needed to protect our city.
Another moment in time for Councilmember Hadley was last Tuesday when she gave her extended remarks about the Firefighters. She began by stating she loves the Firefighters and “who doesn’t love firemen?” But then she proceeded down a negative path by accusing the Firefighters of spreading lies (her word) about her.
Councilmember Hadley repeated the rumors that she heard but did not state if she had verified the source, nor did she state if she had a conversation with the Firefighters in an attempt to resolve the issue. Were the rumors true, false, or a misunderstanding? This appears to us a private matter between Ms. Hadley and the Firefighters, and it should have been handled privately.
Using the power of the City Council dais to repeat unsubstantiated rumors about the Firefighters when they could not refute or defend themselves at this juncture of the meeting, was, in our opinion, taking advantage of the power of her position. It was unsettling to watch and hear a Councilmember delve into a 5-minute beratement from her seat of authority. It was a bridge too far for a sitting Councilmember.
We saw a similar abuse of power at a School Board meeting last fall when President Jennifer Fenton spent several minutes berating parents she thought were spreading rumors about her.
It is a privilege to be elected by your neighbors to serve the residents, the community, and the city. Sometimes emotions get the best of our leaders and they make mistakes. But a true test of one’s character is the willingness to admit when we make a mistake and what we do next.
~MBStrong
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~MBStrong