City Suspends Contract Negotiations With Firefighters’ Union

CORPUS CHRISTI – Contract negotiations between the City of Corpus Christi and the CC Firefighters Association fell apart as the city accused the union of negotiating in bad faith, and engaging in unfair labor practices.

This morning, Assistant City Manager Margie Rose read the cease and desist letter to the Firefighter Association negotiators. The union reps asked her to stop and asked for a break. When she didn’t, they walked out.

In the letter, the city is saying the fire association needs to stop the “Become A Hero” campaign. It also states they need to discontinue making any comments on social media about negotiation topics. City staff also claims misinformation is also being given to the media.

The city says the Firefighters Association broke their agreement for the contract negotiations by making it a public issue. The agreement states that all negotiations need to be conducted only between the city and union.

The city claims by starting their “Become A Hero” campaign last month and going to the media about fire station #18, they broke that agreement.

The City Manager also said because new fire stations and staffing are currently part of the negotiation discussion, any mention of those issues from either side is illegal.

In response to the city’s letter, Firefighter Association negotiator told me, “we’ve got seven guys on our team and nobody has talked about anything that we’re negotiating at the table.”

Since the Firefighter Association’s campaign has been going on since early April, KRIS 6 News asked why the decision was made by city staff to serve the union with the letter now.

The city’s Public Information Director, Kim Womack, told us “Well, it came to a head in regards to some of the things that were happening. It seemed to be ramping up more and more and so the more we see the violations it just got to a point that we needed to draw a line in the sand.”

According to the letter, the firefighters union has until Friday to stop their “Become A Hero” campaign and respond to the city.

http://www.kristv.com/news/city-suspends-contract-negotiations-with-firefighters-union/