Make the city that works work

March 31, 2005

Chicago has long called itself the city that works. But that's accurate only in the peculiar vision of citizens who don't mind paying for inefficient uses of time and money.

The truth is that city government here should work better for its taxpayers--as well as for city employees. But decades-old union work rules hamstring City Hall from getting work done more efficiently. And those wasteful ways drain city resources that are already stretched thin.

Mayor Richard Daley says he's determined to change this. In current talks with the city's non-public safety unions, his negotiators are challenging antiquated work rules, particularly in the construction trades, that boost the cost and time of completing even simple tasks. In exchange, the city is offering to pay the same wages that prevail in the private sector and will consider making those wages retroactive to the date the union contracts expired two years ago.

Even with those carrots, this is going to be a bruising battle. The city's trade unions are accustomed to operating in a certain way.

That is no longer acceptable. The mayor wants to bring the unions into the 21st Century--a time when taxpayers need to get the most for their dollars. Daley wants to give Chicago a more flexible workforce so this city remains competitive and continues to attract businesses and residents. It's imperative that he succeed. More than 80 percent of the city's $2.8 billion operating budget--$2.24 billion--is spent on personnel-related costs. Chicago can no longer afford work rules that don't make full advantage of each employee.

Here's what the city wants to accomplish: Reduce the amount of overtime paid. Reduce the size of work crews where possible. Increase flexibility in assigning workers to tasks. Pay beginning workers less than those with many years' experience. These are not revolutionary concepts. The private sector embraced them long ago, as did many suburban governments.

Yet most unionized city workers still get overtime pay for working on a Saturday--even if Saturday is part of their regular workweek. Most workers also get paid overtime for working more than eight hours a day even if their total workweek doesn't exceed 40 hours. Here's another example: Chicago vacuum trucks that clean out the sewers carry three-man crews. In many suburbs, a single worker mans those trucks. Those other two employees could do other city work.

City Hall wants the right to pay union workers straight time for a 40-hour workweek that runs Tuesday through Saturday or Wednesday through Sunday. This concept isn't foreign to some workers. It has already been introduced for garbage crews working Saturdays in the Loop and for painters and electricians working nights at O'Hare International Airport. The reality is that garbage needs to be picked up seven days a week, and light bulbs at the airport need to be changed at all hours. The city shouldn't have to pay overtime to accomplish such basic, everyday and regularly scheduled tasks.

Union critics charge that the mayor's attack on work rules is just a stalking horse for more privatization--as if trying to make Chicago work more efficiently by any reasonable means weren't a worthy goal. In truth, the mayor's people are offering a challenge: If Chicago's union workers can perform the work efficiently, let's see them do it. They work for taxpayers who shouldn't have to pay top dollar for inefficiency.