The city is poised to turn back the clock on nearly 25 years of gains providing comparable worth pay equity for women and people of color employed by the city. On September 16, between 1,500 and 2,000 layoff notices will be sent to city employees, disproportionally targeted to women and people of color in the lowest paid city jobs in the secretarial, clerical, and nursing assistant job classifications.
The city coyly refers to cutting employee salaries through forced demotions as "de-skilling." In reality, it involves "devaluing" work performed by these employees by lowering the value (amount) of their pay, while requiring them to continue performing essentially the same work.
In November 1986, San Francisco voters passed Proposition H, intended to correct the then decades-long practice of disproportionately underpaying women and minorities. Prop H required annual pay equity salary surveys, and provided a practical approach to gradually increase salaries to provide comparable worth. By 1991, sufficient gains had been made that voters then approved Proposition B, which eliminated setting salary raises based on surveys and instead implemented collective bargaining. Collective bargaining gains between 1991 and 2006 increased comparable worth pay equity for women and minority city employees.
Those gains are rapidly being undone by Mayor Gavin Newsom's administration, and have been for several years. Despite a labor agreement reached in June with Service Employees International Union that gave back $45 million in concessions to help balance the city's current budget, the mayor now wants to extract more from SEIU-represented employees.
As part of the $45 million in concessions, over 100 certified nursing assistant and clerical employees have already been unfairly demoted to lower-paid job classifications in the current fiscal year. Now, within just the Department of Public Health, an additional 400 city employees face demotion on November 15.
But across all city departments, 985 employees in the 1400-series clerical job classifications and 811 certified nursing assistants face 17.5 percent to 20.5 percent pay cuts in November. Some clerical employees will receive pay cuts of $10,530, while full-time nursing assistants will suffer $12,714 pay cuts annually. This will be devastating, and will wipe out salary gains hard fought for during the past 25 years.
These 1,800 employees are being asked to sacrifice another $11.2 million in salary discrimination this year, so the Newsom administration can maintain its bloated ranks of senior management.
If the 214 clerical people who earned less than $40,000 as part-time employees during calendar year 2008 are devalued and handed a 17.5 percent pay cut, they will then earn less than $33,000 annually. Similarly, of the 811 CNAs on the city's payroll during 2008, 255 – or 31.4 percent – were "as needed" and part-time employees who earned less than $30,000 annually in base pay. If they are de-skilled – read: devalued – these 255 dedicated part-time nursing assistants will earn less than $24,000 annually. The de-skilling of Laguna Honda Hospital's CNAs flies in the face of logic, since it contradicts a recent consultant report (required under the Laguna Honda Chambers settlement agreement) performed by Davis Ja and Associates that recommended increasing training and skills of LHH CNAs.
Apparently, keeping the ranks of managers with lucrative disposable incomes happy is a prerequisite for running for governor. Since Newsom became mayor in January 2004, the number of employees represented by the Management Executives Association has increased 19 percent with the addition of 168 managers between 2004 and 2008, according to data from the city controller. Between calendar years 2007 and 2008, managers in the 0900-series classifications earning more than $100,000 annually in base pay increased by 82 employees, at an additional cost of $9.5 million. Muni also added 20 managers earning more than $100,000 annually in the 9100-series classifications, costing another $2.8 million in base pay.
The combined $12.3 million increase in manager salaries stands in stark conflict with the $11.2 million clerical employees and nursing assistants are now expected to sacrifice.
Citywide, employees earning over $100,000 annually grew between calendar year 2007 and 2008 by 732 employees, costing an additional $111.2 million annually in base pay, overtime, and "other" pay.
In addition to the $45 million in SEIU budget concessions reached in June, things have grown worse for clerical employees and nursing assistants. Between the December end-of-year 2008 payroll and the city's end-of-June 2009 payroll, there are 342 fewer clerical employees in the 1400-series classifications (including unit clerks), 187 fewer nursing assistants, and 34 fewer licensed vocational nurses and psychiatric technicians in the 1300-series on the city's payroll. These 563 fewer employees – many of them part-time and "as-needed" employees – were double-crossed following their contract concessions, particularly since there are only 35 fewer managers in the 0900-series across these two payroll periods. While the mayor's office indicated last spring that all city employees would have to "share the pain" of budget cuts, it's clear that it's largely women and people of color in the lower job classification codes who are being vindictively punished by devaluing their salaries.
Between 2007 and 2008, a total of 3,797 public safety personnel (firefighters, police officers, and sheriff's deputies) earning over $100,000 (including an additional 298 safety employees) have seen their pay climb by $58.6 million to a total of $513.2 million, which is now probably much higher in 2009, since their pay is still driven by salary surveys despite collective bargaining. Their salaries are funded, in part, by devaluing clerical and nursing assistant salaries.
The San Francisco Democratic Party and the San Francisco Labor Council recently passed resolutions supporting comparable worth pay for city employees. In 1986, the Harvey Milk and Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic clubs supported Prop H for pay equity. Please join them, and several of the city's leading women's organizations, by contacting your district supervisor. Urge them to support a Comparable Worth Supplemental Budget Appropriation now being proposed in City Hall to stop turning back the clock on pay equity gains made over the past 25 years.
And remind the mayor that salary discrimination against women and people of color isn't a California value voters expect from their next governor.
Patrick Monette-Shaw is an open-government accountability advocate and has been a San Francisco budget watchdog for the past decade. Full disclosure: He is also a secretary employed by the city at Laguna Honda Hospital, and is the elected immediate past president of the Laguna Honda Hospital Ancillary Professionals Chapter of SEIU's former Local 790.