Firefighter Staffing

Do’s and Don’ts

DO

Document your services to the community.

Document your successful operations and programs.

Document your prevention and education activities.

Document your community presence at every opportunity.

Document the assets, the jobs, and the tax base, that you are preserving.

Talk about company availability.

Treat the public with professionalism, kindness, and courtesy.

When they need you, they are not usually having a good day. Remember, you may have been to dozens of fires, hundreds of wrecks, and thousands of sick calls, but must people are experiencing their first and only one, and it is tragic for them.

Remember that your mostly secure job has been funded by the taxes of others who may have recently lost their own jobs.

DO NOT

Overemphasize response time.

They are not listening. Most people long to live and vacation in settings where response do not matter as much.

Talk about reaching medical calls in three minutes every time.

They know about having to wait for hours in hospital emergency rooms, doctors offices, and clinics.

Brownout stations or companies.

If you don’t need them 24/7/365 – you don’t need them.

Implement rotational brownouts.

Don’t tell them that a company isn’t needed, but that by rotating closures; you can’t prioritize which ones you don’t need. You are actually telling them that you don’t need any from the rotation schedule. Russian roulette has 5 blanks and one bullet – you see the bullet, they see the blanks.

Abuse sick time.

The media is watching.

Do anything that you would not do in front of your parents.

Acts of stupidity, recklessness, and criminal arrests make great headlines.

Inflate your run statistics.

Non duty responses will be scrutinized.

Play the “Buildings will burn and people will die” game.

All fires left alone will go out by themselves eventually and the sick will either get better or worse. You know it – they know it. Talk about what you do for them – not what will happen to them.

What the Public, the Politicians, and the Press Are Saying

For Valley’s Public Employee Unions, Tactics Change with Times

By Joe Schoenmann (contact)

Las Vegas Sun

9/2/2012

These aren’t the best of times for organized labor.

All around, public employee unions are coming under fire as groups of privileged workers who earn good wages and benefits while most in the private sector wallow in the doldrums of the Great Recession.

Republican political leaders in Wisconsin, Ohio and other states have actively pushed anti-union legislation. The furor in Wisconsin led to a failed recall-election against anti-union Gov. Scott Walker that may, in turn, embolden further attacks on unions in coming years.

In any case, it certainly hasn’t helped a nation where public employee unions have stretched over the decades into almost every line of work supported by taxpayers.

In Southern Nevada, Clark County and Las Vegas, unions represent police, firefighters, transit workers, prosecutors, different types of administrators, nurses, maintenance workers, janitors, security guards and more.

For decades, their benefits rose with the fortunes of a growth economy. Everyone it seemed, even private-sector workers, made good money. Tax revenues were high, so rather than open messy labor battles, politicians mostly gave in and gave public-worker unions what they wanted.

When the economy dropped into the abyss in 2007, tax revenues went with it – but union benefits remained. Five years later, politicians who fought to cut into those benefits are reviled by unions but praised by many taxpayers.

Some unions are still fighting. Las Vegas firefighters have denounced city approval of a fire department study that could lead to cost-savings as unnecessary. In June, North Las Vegas police supervisors sued the city to stop a move to gut parts of its union contract.

Last month, the Sun wrote about firefighters in Las Vegas, North Las Vegas and Clark County endorsing a campaign to slam private ambulance companies, seen by some as an attempt to ensure that firefighter EMT service doesn’t fall to the budget blade.

At other times, though, the unions have done what would have been unthinkable three or four years ago: They have issued statements of conciliation; they have given up sacred benefits, such as longevity pay, in light of southern Nevada’s unrelenting economic struggle. Gone is the anti-administrative rhetoric from Clark County firefighters; and where the police union threatened political retribution to those who didn’t see a contract their way some four years ago, it has worked nearly hand-in-hand with the sheriff to approve contracts quickly.

The myriad smaller unions rise and fall with the fortunes of the Big Three: SEIU, firefighters and police. Here’s a primer on how circumstances have changed for the major unions in the past five years.

Service Employees International Union

The SEIU represents healthcare workers, maintenance staff and, in the Regional Transportation Commission of Southern Nevada, civil engineers, public information coordinators, planners, traffic signal workers and others.

In early 2007, little notice was paid to a contract between the SEIU and Clark County that granted a 3 percent raise retroactive to 2006, a 4 percent raise in July 2007 and 3 percent boosts in the next two years. At the same time, thousands of those union members remained eligible for merit-pay increases.

Over four years, the raises cost the county an additional $77 million. At the time, a county spokesman called the raises “fair” because they were less than increases in the consumer price index.

County officials also worried they could lose even more if they took their case to an arbitrator. That’s because North Las Vegas had recently granted 4 percent raises in each of four years to its union workers. Arbitrators partially base decisions on wages and benefits in surrounding communities; bigger increases in North Las Vegas result in bigger raises in Clark County.

Zoom ahead five years. The financial landscape changed and so have contract terms and negotiation tactics. County administrators, backed by commissioners who seem to scrutinize every dollar spent, acknowledged in late 2011 that in the previous three years, the SEIU’s 5,000 workers had averaged wage increases of 12.6 percent total. (At the same time, county prosecutors had received nearly 15 percent in wage increases.)

In August 2011, county commissioners approved a binding agreement forcing some 3,000 University Medical Center workers to pay back an average of $280 each, part of a deal to cut their pay by 2 percent.

Both moves sent a strong signal that county administrators had the support of elected county commissioners.

A few months later, the county and SEIU agreed to a two-year contract that froze longevity pay for a year, erased merit increases for two years and eliminated cost-of-living raises for the same two years. The deal with some 5,000 employees saved the county $20.4 million over two years.

A few weeks ago, SEIU and Regional Transportation Commission negotiators came back with what they believed would be a contract accepted by the commission’s board. Except the board didn’t like it. While other unions had eliminated longevity pay for new hires, this contract proposal kept longevity pay, albeit at a lower rate. And while it tied various pay raises to the consumer price index – which hadn’t been done in previous contracts – transportation commissioners said no and told them to come back with something more austere.

Nick DiArchangel, SEIU spokesman, sees the shift in politics as an opportunity for the unions to become more creative and cohesive.

“You’re going to start seeing public employee unions say ‘we have solutions, we have ideas,’ which are not ‘don’t take from us, don’t take,’ but are paths upon which to build stronger service,” he said. “I think in places where you see things being taken away, the unions haven’t stepped up and said we have a solution.”

What DiArchangel doesn’t see is the demise of unions, which appears to be the wish of various policymakers around the country.

“People with regressive politics have done a great job of tying the economic collapse to public employees and saying that reducing services is the solution,” he added. “This ignores the facts of who created the economic crisis and the housing collapse.”

He doesn’t think a majority of the public feels that way, though.

“I don’t see a public backlash against public employees, and that might be because they make up such a huge portion of our economy,” DiArchangel said, noting his wife is a special-education teacher. “We’re so connected to the fabric of the community. You can’t say ‘that public employee’, because that very same person is in your house or your neighbor.”

Police

Of all the union/administration relationships, perhaps none has appeared as easygoing as the one between the union representing Metro Police officers and the sheriff. As Sheriff Doug Gillespie reported, for 25 years until 2010, Metro’s budget increased 10 percent each year.

A sizable portion of those increases resulted in higher wages and benefits for officers.

But cracks began to appear in 2005, when the union and the staff of former Sheriff Bill Young presented a four-year contract that increased wages and benefits 25.6 percent, or more than 6 percent each year. The contract, however, failed to gain enough votes of Metro’s Fiscal Affairs Committee.

At the time, County Commissioner Tom Collins served as one of two commissioners on the committee. Fearing he would vote in favor of the fat contract, Collins’ fellow commissioners voted 6-1 to remove him from the committee. His replacement, Rory Reid, voted “no” to help defeat the contract. An arbitrator later approved a contract granting wages and benefits totaling 22 percent over four years.

By the time new contract talks came around in 2010, the economy was in full slump.

The union quickly agreed to no cost-of-living increases, though the contract kept intact 4 percent step increases for an officer’s first 10 years and longevity pay that starts at 5 percent and maxes out at 15 percent. Las Vegas and Clark County, which co-fund a majority of Metro’s budget, also agreed to fund all of the state-mandated increases in pension contributions.

Two years later, even relatively tiny wage increases are being rejected. In May, Fiscal Affairs rejected the sheriff’s recommendation for a two-year contract, beginning July 1, 2013, that would give police 3 percent merit increases in year one and 1 percent in year two. When that didn’t fly, he offered 1 percent and 1 percent.

That didn’t fly, either, and negotiations continue.

Chris Collins doesn’t sound worried. The executive director of the Police Protective Association is looking at his union numbers and membership is up by a few percentage points.

He thinks membership numbers are doing well because of two factors; the economy and “the department’s more aggressive stance in discipline and terminations.”

At the same time, they union has avoided making itself a target in the public’s eyes.

“I’m not going to say we’ve fared well (with contracts) but we’ve done as well as anybody in the country as far as what we’ve given back,” Collins said. “We’ve come to terms with the city and county for three years in a row and have avoided arbitration and the big public battles.”

He added that “image is important. The police department needs the public trust.”

When the economy bottomed out, Collins said, unions were caught somewhat off guard by the political attacks against their members. “Public unions did not get out and counter those claims very well, with proof and documentation to say, look, that’s simply not true.”

A new coordinated effort among police associations across the country to disseminate more information about public union costs and benefits, he hopes, will change perceptions.

“As we provide more facts and willingly enter debate, the sentiment will change,” Collins said. “But it’s going to take some doing.”

Fire

No public unions in Southern Nevada have been more beloved for so many years past, yet so reviled in recent times, than those representing firefighters.

Here’s how the leader of another public union, who did not want to be identified, put it: “They lived large for what, 100 years? They’ve always been the most popular. Always been the good guys. Not anymore.”

Only 10 years ago, for example, it was practically sacrilege – or at the least, political death – to square off against a firefighter union. Former County Commissioner Erin Kenny is said to have won her election to office in 1994 and 1998 as a result of her support from firefighters, who campaigned for her door to door.

That kind of power politicians ignore at their own peril.

It’s the kind of power that resulted in firefighter union contracts like no other in the breadth and scope of benefits earned. In the view of some elected leaders, it also created a backdrop that allowed more freedom for firefighters to wrack up large overtime benefits by, as Commissioner Steve Sisolak puts it, “gaming the sick-leave system.”

And then the economy tumbled.

In the past three years, local politicians have pummeled firefighter unions like no other. They made a big target. Firefighters’ benefits and wages are better than everyone else’s, so government bodies looked to those areas for savings.

When the unions fought back without volunteering concessions – their argument was sound from one standpoint: those lucrative contracts were signed by elected leaders – it made headlines.

The change started three years ago. If Erin Kenny was the Clark County Commission poster child for union love, Sisolak is the guy whose poster graces dartboards in county fire stations.

Sisolak took office in 2008, right around the time the economy tanked. Almost immediately, he began criticizing the wages and benefits of firefighters. Two years ago, for instance, the average county firefighter collected wages and benefits totaling $189,000, much of it coming from overtime.

The county firefighter union fought back hard. Members once showed up at one of Sisolak’s informational meetings at Lake Las Vegas, their arms folded as they stood in the back of a meeting room, to stare and try to intimidate him. Sisolak started scrutinizing sick-leave usage, which results in overtime pay and pension contributions for firefighters called to replace a sick co-worker.

The union, meanwhile, fought to maintain hard-won wages and benefits, leading to a contract stalemate. An arbitrator heard the case and sided with the county, adding it did appear some firefighters were gaming the sick-leave system.

Months later, the county fired two firefighters for sick-leave use; both won their jobs back. Meanwhile, the FBI is continuing an investigation into the sick-leave issue.

Remarkably, the county and firefighter union are trying to make nice.

Negotiators for both sides wrapped up two contracts within months of each other earlier this year, saving the county millions; sick-leave and its resulting overtime have fallen dramatically; and in July, Sisolak wrote a lengthy letter to the editor proclaiming “there are many hard-working, honest firefighters who deserve our respect and gratitude.”

Too good to be true? To be sure, there is a bottom-line rationale behind the niceties. In two years, Clark County voters will be given the chance to vote on a special property tax that benefits the Fire Department. Should voters turn down the proposal, the county will have to make up an estimated $15 million that currently contributes to wages, operational costs and capital projects.

Many could lose their jobs. Will they be firefighters or other county employees? Many could lose their jobs. Will they be firefighters or other county employees?

* * *

Sisolak says he doesn’t want, nor does he see the day when public employee unions disappear. But echoing the sentiments of people those on both sides of the fence over the last four to five years, he said the days of fat contracts with no questions asked are gone.

“I think there will always be more scrutiny from here on in,” Sisolak said, adding that even if the economy improves, the memory of this economic downturn will stick in people’s minds for decades to come.

“In this case, I don’t think people’s memories are going to be short,” he added. “No one wants to go through these kind of gut-wrenching decisions again in the future.”

Grand Jury Looks at Fire Agencies

San Bernardino County Sun

11/13/2013

The 2010-11 Santa Clara County Grand Jury looked at the nine fire agencies in that northern California county and found that only 4 percent of the calls for service were to fires, with 70 percent being for medical service and the rest situations including rescues and hazardous materials.

"Fire departments should rethink their response protocols -- which are based on an historically fire-oriented model that does not match today's overwhelmingly medical-based demand for emergency services," the report says. "Given that approximately 70% of calls to fire departments are reporting medical emergencies rather than fire, and that only one of every three crew members (33%) is trained to respond to medical situations and conditions, there appears to be a mismatch between service needed and service provided."

A paramedic typically makes significantly less than a firefighter or firefighter/paramedic, while a fire engine costs five times what an ambulance does, causing unnecessary wear and tear on expensive vehicles, according to the report.

The report also suggests consolidating services from neighboring departments and reorganizing staffing so that seasons or times of day that are known to have a lower number of calls have fewer firefighters.

"In their responses to Grand Jury questions regarding firefighter staffing and salary levels, some interviewees described firefighting as 'the best part-time job in America,' conceding these well-rewarded firefighters wear 'golden handcuffs,'" the report says. "Others acknowledged that firefighters are paid for '23 hours of sitting around for one hour of work' because that is how 'insurance' works."

Firefighters unions in Santa Clara County criticized the report, saying firefighters can respond more quickly, and no major suggestions from the report were implemented.

Private For Profit Firefighting Services

The Private For Profit Firefighting Services industry has recorded impressive growth over the past decade, with revenue posting double-digit gains. Industry growth is largely attributable to a rising trend toward privatization, driven by cutbacks in state and local funding for public sector fire departments. Consequently, governments are increasingly contracting with private sector fire departments, which can be hired on an as-needed basis.

For instance, from 2009 to 2011, the number of public sector firefighters decreased an average 0.6% per year, while the number of private firefighters grew an average 16.9% per year, according to data sourced from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. “Furthermore,” says IBISWorld industry analyst Caitlin Moldvay, “insurance companies are increasingly employing private firefighters to pre-treat insured properties and aid in fire suppression efforts to limit potential property damage in the event of a wildfire.” These factors have led to an expansion of private sector firefighting services. Over the five years to 2012, industry revenue is estimated to rise at an average annual rate of 12.5% to $2.1 billion, including projected growth of 9.7% during 2012.

The Private Firefighting Services industry includes privately-operated companies that charge a subscription fee to homeowners and business owners to provide fire prevention and suppression services. “Most often, subscription services are provided to small towns or unincorporated areas without a publicly funded fire department,” adds Moldvay. In addition, companies provide fire protection services to airports and industrial facilities on a contract basis or are employed by insurance companies or government agencies. Over the past five years, the number of private sector firefighters has grown at an average annual rate of 15.0% to an estimated 16,880 employees. The industry exhibits a low level of market share concentration; industry firms are small because there are no economies of scale to be gained through expansion. Additionally, concentration has fallen over the past five years, primarily due to industry expansion.

The Private Firefighting Services industry is expected to continue expanding, with industry revenue projected to rise through 2017. Continued state and local budget shortfalls are anticipated to lead to greater outsourcing to the private sector. Moreover, insurance companies offering private firefighting services to homeowners in the West and Southwest regions will be a continued source of growth for the industry over the coming five years. For more information, visit IBISWorld’s Private Firefighting Services in the US industry report page.

Public Safety Compensation

By Steven C. Johnson and Chris Francescani

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Pharmacist Michael Nastro is full of admiration for how police responded to a deadly robbery in his suburban New York neighborhood in 2011.

A gunman walked into a pharmacy near his own on Long Island, killed four people and fled with a stash of painkillers. Police in the area, which is part of wealthy Suffolk County, best known for the exclusive Hamptons beach towns, boosted patrols and gave advice on what to do if the robber hit again. They caught him three days after the shooting.

But Nastro, 50, admits he's torn about police officers' pay and retirement benefits. "I'd be lying to you if I said I wasn't conflicted," he said. "I want good police work, but I'm a taxpayer too. There's got to be a middle ground."

The average annual pension for Suffolk County cops who have retired since 2007 was $86,702, according to figures from the Manhattan Institute, a public policy think tank, against $37,270 for other county employees, excluding teachers. The county, facing a three-year deficit of $530 million, declared a fiscal emergency in March.

Traditionally, U.S. voters have backed generous pay and benefits for the cops and firefighters willing to risk their lives to keep citizens safe. That was especially so after the deaths of many emergency workers in the September 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center in New York.

But as economic conditions have worsened and many local governments have run into severe fiscal problems, that attitude has started to change. Since the 2007 recession, some cities have tried to roll back pension benefits and pay, among the most rigid and, in some cases, highest expenses in municipal budgets.

From New York to California and points in between, cops and firefighters have been drawn into pitched battles over their pay and benefits.

In San Diego and San Jose, California's second and third biggest cities, voters in June overwhelmingly backed sweeping pension reforms. In San Jose, all employees will have to choose between reduced benefits or higher retirement contributions.

In the mid-sized California cities of Stockton and San Bernardino, officials say public safety costs were among the factors that forced both to declare bankruptcy. In Vallejo, a former U.S. Navy town near San Francisco that emerged from a three-year bankruptcy last year, public safety pay and benefits were consuming three-quarters of the city's general fund.

Detroit, plagued with one of the highest crime rates in the country, nonetheless cut pay and healthcare benefits for city workers, including police, by 10 percent just over a week ago, a move the mayor says will save the cash-strapped city $102 million a year.

A legal challenge by the Detroit Police Officers Association failed, even as union President Joe Duncan publicly complained of what the cuts would mean for Detroit's ability to hire police, noting that the city is "already 50th on the list of pay for the biggest 50 cities in the United States."

St. Louis this month approved an overhaul of the firefighter retirement system that rolls back decades of increases, while Miami officials trying to plug a $60 million budget gap this week declared "financial urgency," which will let them alter employee contracts. Among the city's proposals: limit overtime for firefighters and require higher health care contributions.

According to an analysis by New York-area newspaper Newsday published last month, police and sheriff's department employees in Nassau and Suffolk counties reached nearly two-thirds of each county's payroll.

"That is why a lot of municipalities are choosing bankruptcy, because it's the only way - other than getting a state control board - of getting out of these salary and pension requirements,'' said the former top official of Suffolk County, Steve Levy.

SAVINGS AND SAFETY

Striking the right balance between savings and safety is a touchy business, though.

While it's become almost routine for voters to rail against fat paychecks and generous benefits for teachers, transit workers and other public employees, cops and firefighters have in the past been largely spared such anger.

For example, in Wisconsin, where most public workers were stripped of their collective bargaining rights and made to pay more to fund their pensions, firefighters, cops and other public safety workers were given an exemption.

Still, Jim Carver, president of the Nassau County Police Benevolent Association, says politicians have started to target cops and firefighters. The state seized control of Nassau County's finances after the county failed to balance its budget and had its credit rating cut last year.

Carver bristles at the notion that police and firefighters don't deserve what they earn.

"After 9/11, you couldn't find a politician that wasn't rushing to put his arms around a cop or a firefighter," he said. "Ten, 12 years later, we are to blame for everything. Politicians have made us the enemy. We didn't put a gun to anybody's head. These were fairly negotiated contracts."

"EVERYBODY'S COMPLICIT"

To be sure, it took decades of bad decisions and poor management by local authorities to put many communities in fiscal dire straits. In countless cases, cities, counties and states over-promised benefits to retirees but neglected to set aside sufficient reserves to cover their liabilities.

When the economy and stock market were booming, cities often sweetened pension benefits, confident the money would be there in the end. After 9/11, the cops and firefighters' heroic status with the public meant that they were in a particularly strong bargaining position.

But the 2007-2008 recession and the impact of the housing bust on real estate taxes hammered municipal revenues and badly hurt pension funds' investment returns.

The Pew Center on the States said the gap between states' pension promises and liabilities was $757 billion in 2010.

"Everybody's complicit in this,'' said Lawrence Levy, executive dean of the National Center on Suburban Studies at Hofstra University.

Noel DiGerolamo, head of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association in Suffolk County, has harsh words for the public officials, saying they should be bearing the blame for fiscal woes.

"Rather than being responsible leaders of government and saying, ‘We have these pension obligations that we're going to have to pay,' and saving towards those obligations, they are being politicians," DiGerolamo said. "And when the bill comes due, blaming employees who have worked towards and earned these pensions for 20 or 25 years."

BROKE IN CALIFORNIA

Of course, scores of municipalities are managing to balance their budgets even as costs rise. Only a few of the 90,000 issuers in the municipal debt market are in true distress.

Even many with escalating pension costs can meet their current obligations. It's keeping up with promises to aging citizens who are living longer that keeps officials up at night.

In some cases, contracts that may once have seemed fair are helping to bankrupt cities and leading to severe cuts in services, including fire station closures and reductions in police forces. Eight municipalities have sought protection from their creditors so far this year, following 13 that filed in 2011, and many others are having to slash their budgets.

San Bernardino, a city of 210,000 some 65 miles east of Los Angeles that has been hit hard by the collapse of the housing market, says public safety spending eats up 73 percent of its general fund budget, with overtime for firefighters especially onerous. Pension costs are expected to reach $25 million this year, double the 2006 level.

The city imposed a temporary 10 percent pay cut, but the firefighters' union successfully challenged it in court and is entitled to back pay. The city council voted last week to suspend debt payments and quit paying into a retiree health fund.

Some 350 miles to the north, Stockton, the biggest U.S. city ever to file for bankruptcy, allows police officers to retire at 50 with pensions based on 3 percent of final pay for each year in service.

When he signed the bankruptcy filing in June, Stockton city manager Bob Deis said a 1996 decision to provide firefighters with free health care in retirement, later expanded to all city employees, was a "Ponzi scheme" that saddled the city with a $417 million liability.

Because their jobs are dangerous and physically taxing, cops and firefighters typically retire after 20 or 30 years on the job, and that's as it should be, said Michael Coleman, a policy adviser for the League of California Cities, an association of municipal officials from the state.

But that's why it's important to keep pensions reasonable.

"I don't think anyone disagrees that these are dangerous jobs. But how much is enough? Unfortunately, I think it's gone too far," Coleman said.

The contrast between benefits in the public and private sectors is stark.

Only 26 percent of U.S. companies offer retiree healthcare benefits, compared with 66 percent that did so in 1988, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Most private sector employees bear the brunt of providing for their retirement by saving money in funds known as 401(k) plans, with companies typically also making contributions. After the 2007 recession, some firms stopped making contributions altogether.

It can all add to tensions as some taxpayers question why their services are being cut or property taxes raised so a city or county can find the money for generous retirement benefits.

In New York, a 2010 investigation by then-attorney general Andrew Cuomo, now governor, found widespread incidence of "pension padding" - public employees working extra overtime in their last year on the job to boost pay and retirement income.

That's especially costly when it comes to well-paid public safety workers. The Manhattan Institute estimates nearly 10 percent of New York State cops and firefighters who retired in 2011 will receive six-figure pensions, from 2 percent in 2001.

NO QUICK FIXES

Quick fixes, however, are unlikely.

Efforts to revamp public pension plans face stiff legal challenges. Each state has its own constitution, courts and case law that affect how it can go about changing retirement systems.

Firefighters in San Bernardino have filed seven legal actions against attempts to scale back pay and benefits since 2007.

In many municipalities, public salaries and pensions are pegged to those offered in comparably sized regional cities. In New York, pensions, once set by the state, cannot be negotiated through collective bargaining.

At the same time, alternative ways to tackle deficits, such as raising taxes, are politically unpopular.

In the small Southern California city of Stanton, voters recently rejected a proposed utility tax hike that would have raised $1.1 million. The city instead cut back on active police and fire staff, which account for 77 percent of its spending.

"Will there be some impact on response time? There could be," said city manager Carol Jacobs. "But this city is not going to go bankrupt."

In some cases, unions have preferred layoffs to reduced retirement benefits. Two troubled cities in New Jersey are cases in point. Camden, one of the state's poorest and most crime-plagued cities, recently cut its police force by about half, and Newark cut its force by a third after unions declined concessions demanded by their city governments.

In New York, former Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi, a Long Island Democrat who has clashed with police unions, gave a stark assessment. "We're facing a problem that will be faced by every town in America.

"You can't raise property taxes anymore - people won't go for it. There's no more money. So, do you cut services, which will result in the death of the suburbs, I think, or do you make these salaries and pensions more rational than they've been?"

(Additional reporting by Hilary Russ in New York, Ronald Grover and Tori Richards in Los Angeles, and Jim Christie in San Francisco; Editing by Martin Howell and Leslie Adler)