Patrick offered this common-sense observation: “I take a lot of heat over this . . . but 49 other states seem to be able to get by with a blend of flaggers and police details and that’s all we’re trying to do.”
Noting that Bill Weld, Baker’s mentor, once tried (briefly) to move to flaggers, the governor cast himself as the real reformer. “They talked about flaggers,” he said. “We did it.”
Point to Patrick.
In fact, Baker is in such bad shape on this issue that even the usually Deval-phobic Globe commenters are, at least in some cases, showing some sympathy with him, and are trashing Baker.
gotham23 wrote:
As far as I can tell, Baker thinks we’re all stupid.…
beachmama94 wrote:
Patrick is right–49 states do not require police details and most states use only flaggers. That Massachusetts should go it alone in this regard shows how powerful the police unions are in preventing change. On other issues like education, it seems that Baker is anti-union. What’s up with that and why the contradiction?…
greenmt89 wrote:
In an era where a qualified responsible non-Democrat can win in Massachusetts, the Republicans are coming up very very short.JudgeBean wrote:
Baker should be more concerned about angry citizens who are tired of funding the Quinn Bill and details instead of pandering to police unions. Charlie is looking more and more like a public union hack.JasonSeacrest wrote:
Would Harvard Pilgrim exist today if the state hadn’t intervened?I like Baker, but I just don’t see that he can walk the walk.
…
likesowls wrote:
Charlie, when people are trying to choose between a democrat or a republican trying to sound like a democrat, they will always pick the democrat.Can we have a do-over for the republican nomination for governor?
Remarkable.
So Baker admitted that it’s saving taxpayer dollars, but it’s not enough for his liking so let just spend more instead. Pretty interesting take for the guy that wants to reduce spending.
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p>There has been a lot of slight of hand recently with spending on civilian flaggers and police details. Make no mistake we are saving tax payer dollars, Baker understands this and that’s why he’s describing it in the way he does. Police pensions include money made from paid details. We just don’t pay this once we pay for it over and over. Police also have minimum hours paid, if they show up for 30 minutes they get paid for the day. In addition, a flagger could also other duties on the site, so it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s their only job. For those same 30 minutes the flagger could perform traffic duties, then go back to other projects on site, not still get paid even after leaving the job site.
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p>True — but keep in mind that when the detail is for a private project (NStar, a building near the sidewalk, etc), that private company is paying for the detail and the overhead. Of course, when it’s a public work (sewers, roads, etc) then that money and overhead is coming from the public treasury.
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p>I’m pretty sure it’s 4 hour increments. Given the amount of time to set up equipment, do the work, clean it up, and take down the equipment, it strikes me that 30 minute details are probably quite rare.
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p>I’m not really disagreeing with you, just think that you’re overselling things a tad.
that’s why I had that as an example.
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p>The “We just don’t pay this once we pay for it over and over.” quote is incorrectly attributed to minimum hours worked, that belongs with pensions. But the 4 / 8 does ring a bell. Let me track down that study from a few years ago. It was by the commonwealth.
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p>But if you are somehow implying that police details do not include pay after police complete their need at a job site then you are just wrong.
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p>In addition, “Police pensions include money made from paid details.” You noted it true, and yes that is TRUE. yes, there are other cost factors for privates, but the point here is that tax dollars are impacted long term by these details. There are dollars saved now and long term. The slight of hand I’ve been seeing recently is some of the tings you have noted and somehow implying that we might even be spending more. That is absurd and should be called out.
…is that police details can show up for half-an-hour but will be paid for 4. Perfectly true. And if they work 4 and a half hours, they will be paid for 8. Also true.
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p>And the source of the initial payment – NStar, Ch. 90 or the town – makes no difference. All payment is made by the DEPARTMENT, reimbursement or no, which is why the money goes on the pension. And a single 4 hour detail pays off with decades of pension.
Indeed, I meant to communicate that the increments are 4 hour blocks, not 8. So a 30 minute detail is a 4 hour charge.
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p>When required for a private business, the private business pays for the detail. It’s my understanding that the charge isn’t just for the 4 hours of OT pay, but also includes the charges for pension, OPEBs, and overhead charges. This isn’t something I’m certain of though; I’m just basing it on what my wife pays for details on her job sites and extrapolating.
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p>If anyone has more detail on the price of police details for private jobs, I’d love to read about it.
… contractor are ‘passed on’ because those costs are calculated at bid and included in the bid price.
And when the contract isn’t a public works contract but rather a developer building a parcel, those costs (including overhead I postulate but haven’t been able to confirm) are absorbed by private enterprise, not taxpayers.
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p>The middle ground is utility work, which often requires details and isn’t paid by taxpayers but by ratepayers. Some utilities have a very high subscription rate (electricity), whereas others are high (telephone) and others moderate (cable, gas) and some quite low (T1, steam).
Giganormous Developers don’t cut $110 checks to Officer Fred – they pay the Prescott PD, who then pays Officer Fred. Which is why the ‘cost’ being paid by developers is a red herring – the $110 is chump change, and the pension payout it helps generate is FOREVER…
Maybe his hands were forced, and better to swallow the bitter medicine now than later in the election season, but good grief. This makes Baker look terrible. Of all the unions people love to hate, the police union is way, way up there. Few people physically see iron workers or teachers or government employees on any particular day. But, we all tend to see a cop (or, a cop car) just about every day — and we constantly see them illegally parked, or standing near a jobsite appearing to be doing nothing, etc.
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p>The fact is that while we want and need police officers, many folks have a general slight distaste for them. Now, when people hear about the huge salaries that police officers make and Deval’s efforts to bring things to sanity and Baker coming out in favor of overpaying the cops, they’ll both (a) call Baker an empty suit, and (b) have one data point of Deval Patrick doing something that’s good for the taxpayer in spite of having to say no to a union to do it.
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p>The television ads practically write themselves. The issue is more complex than 30 seconds, but when boiled down Patrick comes out even better… that flaggers don’t save substantial money, or that the salaries of officer details for private projects are paid by the private company can be jettisoned in a 30 sec ad. “After 16 years of Republican governor inaction, Governor Patrick saved taxpayer money by treating construction and road work sites the way the other 49 states do — using a combination of civilian flaggers and uniformed officers. Now Charlie Baker is kowtowing to the police officer’s unions and wants to undo this common sense money saving reform.”
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p>All the while, show photos of officers not actively helping manage the site, complete with gridlock and frustrated drivers.
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p>In fact, Deval doesn’t have to do the ad at all… a third party could. Just follow it up with “Call Charlie Baker and tell him that civilian flaggers can do the job and save taxpayer dollars”
if you’re Deval Patrick, you don’t want to actively agitate the police that way. and you don’t want to actively agitate union members that way.
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p>he’s got to walk a tightrope on the issue of labor in this state. and if you’ve got to make tough decisions, you do it in a cool, calculated policy-oriented way. you don’t escalate it by running ads like that.
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p>i think you may slightly misread the public’s opinion on cops, especially among the voters deval needs to turn out this year. he’s fine on the quinn bill and details, but overall i don’t think he wants to be seen as an enemy of the police.
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p>remember, most cops don’t make the big money you read about in the Herald. and many view their detail money as a very nice piece of gravy, but not undeserved considering some of the very unpleasant other crap they deal with on a day-to-day basis.
you make a good case.
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p>but so does stomv. i’d say it a little differently. voters want authenticity.
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p>baker is representing himself as the guy in the movie Dave. common sense highly rational guy, socially liberal.
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p>as an independent, this move is strike 2 against baker (#1 was becoming a climate change wishy washy guy). it cuts against his authenticity with independents.
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p>so i agree the deval’s best message tone should be “cool”, but coolly cut against baker’s image as rational.
…is put up or shut up.
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p>IF the law is on the books, then the state must pay up. No gypping the towns.
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p>IF you do not want to keep paying the unaffordable stipends, then repeal the law.
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p>The towns and departments are playing by the rules laid down by the Legislature, which is moving the goal posts. No. Let them vote, and on the record – does the program continue or not?
Using an ethnic slander in casual conversation.
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p>You conservatives never disappoint.
I confess I had never even considered that the word gyp comes from the word Gypsy… perhaps because I don’t recall seeing it in print before now.
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p>I checked with m-w and a few other dictionaries, and they claim that gyp is probably derived from Gypsy, but aren’t definitive.
What I’ve read is clear enough … not for a capital conviction, but enough to make it uncomfortable.
heard and I try not to use it for that reason.
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p>There are after all still modern day Gypsies.
I once bought bedsheets from some in Ireland, where the word tinkerer is like using negro, and the preferred noun is “traveler”.
A screen grab:
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p>http://nepba.org/
Unions horrible and awful things unless one wants to pretend that Republicans will make people safer.
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p>It would be interesting to see some data comparing salaries and benefits for different groups of public employees. Some are in the GIC and have copays and deductibles, and some never see any bills.