The Department is waaaaay too top heavy anyway, but Conehead is gutless:
A group of high-ranking Chicago police officials are pushing to form
their own union, setting up a possible fight with Mayor Brandon
Johnson’s administration.
In a letter last month to Militza Pagán,
Johnson’s deputy mayor of labor relations, an attorney with the
Illinois Police Benevolent & Protective Association asked the city
to “voluntarily recognize” a new collective bargaining unit of police
commanders and deputy chiefs. The union already represents sergeants,
lieutenants and captains.
How about "No." It's defined as "Exempt" for many reasons, all of which you VOLUNTEERED for.
You took no test for your spot. In most cases, you demonstrated no actual job skills aside from who you knew or who you blew. You played the political game, you serve at the pleasure of the administration, and you get an undeserved / unearned pension bump that puts you head and shoulders above just about every other public sector retiree, not to mention the "good ol' boys" network that lands you six-figure retirement jobs ON TOP OF the unearned pension.
A source with knowledge of the unionization push said it was launched
after the city curtailed how much time exempt-rank supervisors can
spend on medical leave.
The issue only surfaced when two
commanders were told they needed to return to work, as one remained
hospitalized with a serious illness and the other was recovering from
back surgery, the source said.
Okay, that's just wrong, but wholly undeserving of all of the other protections that come with unionization. If it's that big a deal, go back to your previous Patrol rank that has a Contract.
Commanders and deputy chiefs aren’t afforded other benefits that
other rank-and-file cops get, including earned time off, pay for being
prepared to work during off-hours and allowances for uniforms, the
source said.
Lieutenants are now turning down promotions to become
commanders because of the disparities — something that never used to
happen, the source said.
That makes them the smart ones, and perhaps the ones that Conehead should be looking at to run Units and Districts.
Would you want to try to run a city Department with leftover deadweight who owe their spot and allegiance to previous mayors? They could spend their days undercutting the policies you ran and got elected on and you wouldn't be able to remove them because of union rules.
Screw that.
Labels: dumb ideas