After a year of negotiations, the Crete police union and village have agreed to a new three-year contract that includes salary increases from the financially strapped village.
The Crete Metropolitan Alliance of Police Chapter 36 ratified the contract earlier this month. The village board gave the pact preliminary approval last week and is expected to give it final approval March 8.
The contract calls for a 3 percent wage increase for officers, retroactive to 2009. Also, it calls for the contract to be reopened between February and May 2011 to renegotiate salary.
Mayor Michael Einhorn said he is glad the contract is being accepted by both parties. Hammering out contracts is an “unpleasant facet of local government,” he said.
Police Chief James Paoletti said he is glad the time-consuming process is finished.
“I’m happy for the officers involved. They were waiting nearly a year for this. It’s time to move forward. These are tough economic times to try to negotiate a contract,” he said.
The village had sought a provision allowing it to force officers to take unpaid furloughs, but the union rejected that. Now, village officials said, if spending cuts must be made in the department officers will be laid off.
Also in the contract is a life insurance policy, not related to death while in the line of duty, with an increased payout from $35,000 to $50,000.
Police officers will be able to roll over to the next year up to $300 of their uniform allowance to buy replacement bullet proof vests.
The two sides were set to go into arbitration the first week in March, but the contract was hammered out with the help of a mediator during some 40 hours of negotiations.
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