Layoffs fan flames of ongoing protest

Firefighters union, city at odds over staffing at heated council meeting

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Negotiations between the city and Long Beach Professional Firefighters Local 287 broke down on Tuesday, after the union rejected an offer that city officials said would have temporarily avoided the layoffs of five firefighters and allowed for continued talks about how to save their jobs.

Earlier this month, the city informed the union that it planned to lay off five firefighters on Jan. 1, after a two-year, $910,530 federal grant that enabled the department to rehire members two years ago came to an end.

At a packed City Council meeting on Tuesday — where union members and hundreds of their supporters wore red in a show of solidarity — City Manager Jack Schnirman said that an agreement discussed with the union this week could have delayed the layoffs if the union had agreed to defer a week’s salary to cover the costs of the five firefighters’ salaries while talks continued.

“That agreement has the ability to bring us back to the negotiating table, to open negotiations and discussions and, most importantly, to achieve the goal of keeping these five individuals on payroll so that we can all look for ways to move on together,” Schnirman said. “Unfortunately, that agreement has been rejected by the union leadership.”

Schnirman held up the agreement and a pen during a meeting that grew heated at times, and called on the union to sign it, which drew some jeers from the crowd.

“The power to move this along is in the hands of the folks who just spoke,” Schnirman said, referring to union leaders. “It is up to them; we hope that they will come to the table and sign and save these five jobs.”

But Billy Piazza, president of Local 287, criticized the proposed agreement, saying that it was unfair and would have kept the five firefighters on only through Feb. 15. “If things couldn’t be worked out, it would only drag out the inevitable,” Piazza said after the meeting. “… There was no guarantee that the guys would keep their jobs once that time period is up. And I’ve learned in the past not to sign something that the city gives me without having my attorney review it first, because the last time I did that, they hung it over my head.”

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