The Mayor's Mixtape

The Mayor's Mixtape-Episode 27

• City of Pueblo • Episode 27

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This week on the 27th episode of the Mayor's Mixtape, Mayor Graham celebrates Labor Day talking about the four unions in the City of Pueblo--Fire, Police, General Service and Transit. Union negotiations are an important part of the budget and Mayor Graham talks about wages and expectations for the city employee positions going into 2026 budget discussions this fall. 

 

Plan to attend one of Mayor Graham's upcoming town halls during the month of September. There's a town hall in each of the four districts in the city. Don't forget to like and subscribe on your favorite platform including Apple, Spotify, Buzzsprout, YouTube or watch on local Channel 17. Email your questions or topic suggestions to mayor@pueblo.us. 

Haley Sue Robinson:

All right. Welcome to the 27th episode of the Mayor's Mixtape. I am Haley Sue Robinson, director of Public Affairs for the City of Pueblo.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

And I'm Heather Graham, City of Pueblo Mayor.

Haley Sue Robinson:

And just want to remind you. You can find our podcast on Apple, spotify, youtube, buzzsprout. You can also watch it on Channel 17 for those of you that are local. Wherever you get your podcasts like, subscribe, share and for any questions or topic suggestions, you can email us at mayor@ pueblo. us. Okay, so, mayor, we had a long weekend, which was exciting, and we did have some fun at the Fiesta Day Parade on Sunday, but it was a really good turnout. It was a really good turnout.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

Was it too hot

Haley Sue Robinson:

yeah, both the State Fair Parade and the Fiesta Day Parade cooler than normal. So I was. I didn't sunburn.

Haley Sue Robinson:

So I was happy about that.

Haley Sue Robinson:

I thought, since yesterday was Labor Day, maybe we could talk about our unions. Sure, you know, part of the reason we have Labor Day is because of our unions, and so I thought maybe kind of give a behind the scenes or a little in-depth into our fire, police, our general service and then our transit union here at the city. You've been getting a frequent question recently regarding the budget and why each year our personnel line has grown, and I think one thing that's important to make the distinction there is the personnel line being the budget, not necessarily staff right so

Mayor, Heather Graham:

the wage amount.

Haley Sue Robinson:

correct. Yeah, yeah, the wages so can you talk to us about why those wages sure are increasing?

Mayor, Heather Graham:

Yeah, so the city of pueblo negotiates with four different unions on a yearly basis but in three-year contracts for fire, police in page, if they agree to three-year union, three-year contracts. So what happened is city will use our comparable cities that are listed in the city charter there's like five of them that we look at their comparable wages. The city pays 85% of what other communities pay their uh positions sure, same positions as we have in the city of pueblo, but we only pay up to 85 percent. So what happens is we will negotiate with um the unions over their contracts, um, we'll go back and forth, we We'll take information to city council, usually an executive session, to talk about what the comparable cities are doing and what's our negotiating amount and what that looks like. Sometimes we negotiate other things besides wages, uniforms, sick pay, longevity pay. So each of the unions has also different topics I'll call them within their CBAs between the city, and so we have to look at all of those when we're doing our negotiating.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

But our negotiating is set on factors that are listed in the charter. So okay, um, over the last several years the city has had quite the large reserve because of debruising and all of the money that we have taken in via sales tax from all the federal stimulus money that you've heard me talk about, and so the city has not had an inability to pay over the last five years. So when the unions come to us and want a pay increase, we look at what comparable cities are, we present those percentages to the unions. We do not have an inability to pay, so we pay whatever that wage increase is. Or if both sides can't come to a middle ground, we go to arbitration. So we have binding arbitration with PD and FIRE. This year the voters are going to decide whether we have binding arbitration with the General Services Union, which we currently don't have right now.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

So I think that is item 3C on the upcoming ballot is whether the community wants to get page employees General Service employees binding arbitration. So those wages are. They are not set by me. Um, yeah, they are negotiated they are negotiated.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

They are not even set by the city council. They are negotiated, um, they are ratified by the city council, um, but it all relates to charter factor and what cities we compare to what wages other cities are paying their employees at. That accounts for the increase that you see I keep getting this question about. Tell me about 2023's actual wage line and why 2025 is projected as $20 million higher, and so by the time that 2025 closes out, we're not going to be $20 million higher. That's our projected amount for 2025. That's if all positions in the city of Pueblo are paid at the top dollar fully staffed.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

That doesn't happen. We currently have 39 vacancies as of this morning the Pueblo Police Department. Okay, that's about a four million dollar savings that you're going to see just in the police department. On top of police and their savings, you also see a few million dollars between all of the other city employees because we have we cannot hire um, you know, when people move on to other positions in the city or different careers um, we kind of have this ongoing hiring process and so we continuously have about a hundred vacant positions um within the City of Pueblo at any time.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

Okay, just because of um promotions and um or even demotions we have folks that transfer yeah and so what I've done over the last two years is really go once those positions come open, as, as long as you're not a first responder, a police officer, a fireman, um, we look at that position and we see if that position is still in need right now in the city. That position could get frozen, which means we still have the position for 2026 budget. We're just not funding it, or it can get abolished completely. So in last year's budget I abolished 18 positions that were no longer in need for the community.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

It's the same thing that we're going to do for 2026's budget, the same thing we're working on. So it is not a wage that I set. The wages that I set are class B employees, appointed positions, and what has typically happened in previous years is class B appointed positions. They get the same percentage as the page union. So, for example, last year, page union got a 2.8% increase and all directors, all class B management positions, also got a 2.8% raise. So it's all really done by charter, not by the mayor, not by city council. It's done through negotiations, it's done through negotiations, through our four union contracts.

Haley Sue Robinson:

Great, okay, I think that's a little more in-depth than most people understand. Most of the time what we see is what comes before city council, like you said, to be ratified, or maybe what's recently been discussed as far as the binding arbitration. But most of the time unless folks are in the union, they don't really know a lot about how that union negotiation goes here in Pueblo. I would say that a lot of times, you see, like Union Proud or Union Town, we have a really strong affinity for unions here in Pueblo From the Steel City, we have really strong unions like the Teachers Union or the Electrical Union, among others here in the city. So I thought, with Labor Day and the fact that that's a great question.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

I've been getting that question a lot, so you can manipulate the way you look at the budget in any way, shape or form. What else I will tell you on the budget is so we kind of have three different states of the budget, right? So you have the proposed. So that's what comes first is what the proposed look. That's pretty much max wages, max projects, max costs of what it costs the city. So that's what I will be presenting to city council is the proposed budget. Halfway through the year we look at the projected budget. We base next year's budget off the projected budget from the year that we're currently in.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

So right now we're looking at the projected from for 2025 to kind of see where we're going to end up. So I know what line items we can take from. I know where we can cut decreases. Um, we are not doing as many projects as we had been previously doing because we're not paving as many roads as we previously been doing. So the projected budget is really what I look at when I put the proposed budget together and then you have the actual budget. So the actual budget is the end budget, that's when it closes out and what was actually next year what was actually spent.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

So when you have community members or staff looking at the different phases of the budget, when you're looking at the final budget that we put out, you're only seeing the actuals and the projected. You're not seeing what was proposed. So there could be $20 million in line items. That's a differential from what the previous year was, because you are looking at the max amount the city will spend in the upcoming year.

Haley Sue Robinson:

So, going back to what you said previously, Right now the police department is down 39 officers, you said. Overall in the city we're roughly 100 people short.

Haley Sue Robinson:

And that can be from transit wastewater.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

It could be part-time employees, it could be utility workers, it could be our enterprises.

Haley Sue Robinson:

But so when you put together that budget, that's if we were fully staffed.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

Fully staffed max pay.

Haley Sue Robinson:

Okay, that budget, that's if we were fully staffed. Fully staffed, max pay okay. So also based on um, each of the positions there's, there's normally a range. Yep, it's not like we're just paying everybody at the top, like for the directors.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

I saw something you know floating around social media yesterday that had all the directors of the city of pueblo listed um, those top lot. I didn't even check because you know the the source wasn't very I wasn't very confident the source that it came from. But when you're looking at those, those top lines, you're looking at the top of the range, sure? Um, I also don't set the range for employees that comes from the HR the department on what the comparables to other communities are which is also 85 for directors absolutely so.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

When you look at um, the literature that's going out, they're looking at max range for all city employees, max range for appointed positions. Some directors might be at their at their first step, sure, um, which could be twenty thousand dollars less than they'll ever get, uh, for their total range, um, for their time at the city of Pueblo. So in my position I have hired five or six appointed positions, and so when we go to make the job offers to the individuals, we really look at their work history, what they're bringing to the table, how long they've been with the city. If it's a city employee, if it's a new employee coming in, I might say something like I'm going to start you off at the lowest pay. We're going to check back in a year, um, and we're going to see what you've accomplished, um, and we're going to talk about your wages moving forward. So that's happened with some of the directors that I've I've hired so um you're looking at a range.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

you're not looking at max pay per position per year.

Haley Sue Robinson:

Okay. So going back to, you mentioned that last year you went line by line and you eliminated 18 full-time positions. So what can we expect? Going in, we're, we've been internally in budget season. I know you've been having meetings one-on-one with directors, which includes Finance, Law, but what can we expect? What will come before city council and your proposals?

Mayor, Heather Graham:

So we're going to have several more abolished positions going into the 2026 budget.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

There'll be some out of my office and I've also asked every department to cut their operating budget by 15%, which is going to save the city several millions of dollars, and we've already handled that. I've also sent all nonprofits-profits um to go through the CSAC application and not through the city of pueblo um to ask for funding, and we will just be providing the money that we usually provide to um CSAC, so that saved several millions of dollars also. And then anybody who is a non-departmental within the city, so you're not actually department in the city but you um, you operate maybe on city property or you have a, you have some kind of operations contract within the City of Pueblo for the City of Pueblo, and so we've also asked those non-departmentals to cut their operating, their total budget, by by 15%, and so we've had success with most of them. There's still a couple that we're still working through through the contracts and so city council will soon be seeing those as well?

Haley Sue Robinson:

And where did the 15% number come from?

Mayor, Heather Graham:

15%. So shoot, I don't know, maybe six months ago we had a work session for city council in which they gave direction on what they wanted to see for 2026's budget. Okay, and the 15% number was specifically thrown out by Councilor Gomez at the budget. So that was the top line.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

Okay, you know, some said five, some said 10, but we took it all the way to 15%, cutting the operations 15% through the city, through the non-departmentals. We also talked about how we could potentially cut some of the wages down. I made a presentation to city council about what it would look like if we had to cut part-time employees. I'm not going to be presenting that route to city council because quality of life, services sure will not be maintained within the city of Pueblo and I don't think that that's what the taxpayers want. But that direction came directly from the city council on the percentages that they want to cut.

Haley Sue Robinson:

okay, and one thing in particular you mentioned was our non-departmentals.

Haley Sue Robinson:

So, while our departments across the city are all cutting their budgets by 15 percent, I thought one thing in particular that was interesting is we recently had a presentation from the Pueblo Zoo. In all actuality, their budget's actually only being cut by a pretty small percentage. I think it's what? 2.5%.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

Yeah, so I went back and watched their work session presentation they presented to city council as part of their annual update. And so, because the zoo does an operational agreement with the city and it is on city-owned property, we obviously love our zoo. We want to see our zoo be successful. We obviously love our zoo. We want to see our zoo be successful, and so, instead of doing the 15% you know cut straight across, we've met with them several times to talk about in lieu of giving cash. Can we subsidize your maintenance contract with?

Mayor, Heather Graham:

allowing some of our city departments to go out and do some of your maintenance work instead of giving you cash to do these projects, complete these projects on the zoo property, and so that's one thing that the city is going to be offering to help the zoo, to make sure that we are helping to maintain the property, and so that's specifically one instance that we're using to use some of our staff to go out and provide services in lieu of cash for the zoo,

Haley Sue Robinson:

And I think that's one thing that we can all agree on is the zoo is an amenity, I mean, it's a tourist attraction, but one thing that you talk about frequently is, um, quality of life for our citizens and and things that provide folks with an opportunity to enjoy Pueblo Um, and so, you know, the Pueblo zoo is right in the heart of a city park and and we love the zoo.

Haley Sue Robinson:

And so how are, how are there ways that we can provide for them? And I think you hit kind of some concerns for some folks is how do we alleviate some of their budget concerns with, you know, maintenance, and while we can't provide the dollar figure that we maybe have in the past, just like we can't for public works or for transit or for parks, what can we do instead? Um, and because it is a city-owned asset, it's so important that we maintain that, yep, that quality um and the service that they provide.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

The same thing with the HARP.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

Um, you know, everyone knows, I love the Riverwalk, but we asked them to cut their budget 15% too. But we've been able to address their shortfalls, potentially through the Urban Renewal Authority and RTA funding for the boathouse, in which we'll be able to assist with some of their capital project needs like fixing pavers or railings within the the heart footprint. So we're getting creative on other ways that we can contribute without just giving straight cash. So, okay, it's been a process, it's, but it's working and and I feel confident that we're going to be able to come to city council with a decrease in operations Overall wages. That's going to be a different story because I don't set wages. Those are set by charter, sure.

Haley Sue Robinson:

Any other uh expectations that taxpayers can have going into budget season or or things that um you see on the horizon that are important for folks to understand?

Mayor, Heather Graham:

um so we're going to be presenting the budget uh, first meeting in october, first work session. Um so right now I'm working on capital. What capital?

Mayor, Heather Graham:

outlet is going to look like for 2026. As you know, you've heard me talk a lot about we've gone from, you know, 20 million dollars to three million dollars in capital. Um, it's another reason why we're asking uh the voters to look at a one percent. What that would mean for our community, what that would mean for our infrastructure, is because we've seen these this decrease in uh capital spending from 24, 25 and now into 26. So that's still something that we're working on. We'll be presenting to city council first meeting in October our proposed budget for 2026.

Haley Sue Robinson:

And then that's the opportunity that city council has to direct staff for additional work sessions or ask questions of certain departments. So we'll see more in specific budgets be fire or police or public works or whoever. Okay, yeah, great, okay. Thanks for giving us a breakdown of the budget. I know it is a lot and I and I know it's important to a lot of folks as, as we start into the the later half of the year and obviously you know, internally you've been working on the budget since June but this becomes a really hot topic as we go into these fall months, because folks want to know where my tax dollars going to and what can we expect in the future. Yep, great, okay, well, anything else you want to add to that?

Mayor, Heather Graham:

I don't think so,

Haley Sue Robinson:

Great, I think it's important.

Haley Sue Robinson:

You know, obviously it's a short week we don't have a work session tonight, but I think it's important just for folks to understand what's coming up. I know one thing that's exciting today we have the ballot order drawing for candidates for city council, for the civil service commission, for board of waterworks A lot of exciting, exciting things coming that relate to the city and city leadership. Another thing that I want to remind folks about? Is you have some upcoming town halls? Yeah, uh, so tomorrow night's our first one, tomorrow night is our first one. So district two uh, wednesday September 3rd at five 30 at El Centro. Um, I know we talked about this a little bit last week, but, um, what, what can folks expect from these town halls?

Mayor, Heather Graham:

Yeah, so what can folks expect from these town halls? Yeah, so we picked a town hall in each of the districts and I'll go and give a 10 to 15 minute brief overview on things that are going on in their respective district. We'll talk about paving, we'll talk about police presence, we'll talk about ongoing projects. Okay, you know, specifically, we're going to be at El Centro tomorrow night. I'm going to be giving everybody an update on the kitchen. I don't know if people even know there's a kitchen, a brand new kitchen, in the bottom of that building that we're going to be hoping to do some classes at. So, really just talking about, maybe, how ARPA dollars had been spent within each district budget questions. So it's really just a chance for the community to, you know, ask me what's going on in those districts. So the previous administration, you know Nick would do community connections on Fridays and I attended a lot of those when I was on city council and it was always good to just hear, to proactively talk about what's being done at the city and let people ask questions. So we'll be at El Centro tomorrow night, okay, and one every week.

Mayor, Heather Graham:

We're going to have some city council members there Sure Two, I've heard. So if you have questions for your city council too, I'm sure they'd be willing to take questions from the constituents. And so, yeah, come and hear us talk about the districts tomorrow night okay, great, and uh, those other dates.

Haley Sue Robinson:

District four is Thursday, September 11th, at 5 30, that's at the Rawlings library in Brett, Kelly room B. Uh, District three, Tuesday, September 16th, at lamb library, also at 5: 30, and then finally we'll wrap up the month on Wednesday, September 24th, Bark man at 5: 30. So I I know. Another question uh, I received last week was what if I can't attend my, my district meeting? Can I come to a different?

Mayor, Heather Graham:

Yeah, come to any of them, sure.

Haley Sue Robinson:

okay, so, even though we'll be talking about mostly, uh, specific, there'll be some overall opportunities for folks to ask questions. Okay, great. Well, I think that's a good opportunity for folks to talk to you, talk to city council, maybe hear some updates and maybe ask some questions that they don't normally get to ask. Sure, all right. Well, that wraps us up for episode 27 of the Mayor's Mixtape. I'd like to remind you all you can listen on Apple, Buzzsprout, Spotify , YouTube. You can also find us on Government Channel 17. If you have questions or topic suggestions, email us, mayor@ pueblo. us, and we'll see you next week.