City Council Special Called Meeting Transcript – 12/18/2025 Title: ATXN-1 (24hr) Channel: 1 - ATXN-1 Recorded On: 12/18/2025 6:00:00AM Original Air Date: 12/18/2025 Transcript Generated by SnapStream ================================== Please note that the following transcript is for reference purposes and does not constitute the official record of actions taken during the meeting. For the official record of actions of the meeting, please refer to the Approved Minutes. [9:00:34 AM] Good morning everybody. It's 9:00 in the morning on December 18th, 2025, and I will call to order this special called meeting of the Austin city council. We have a quorum of the city council present, and we are meeting in the city council chambers. It's located in city hall at 301 west second street. Members, you're aware that we have three items on the agenda. The way we'll go forward today is we will first have a presentation by our staff. Then we will go to item number one. We we have a few people that have signed up to speak. What we'll do is we will call the speakers up by the item. We'll call them up the way we the way we typically do at meetings. Each speaker will have two minutes, and we will then open it up for. I'll take a motion and we will then open it up for questions. And actually right after the presentation we'll have questions, but we'll have discussion after a motion if anybody has any discussion. So with that, unless there's any questions or objections I will turn it over to our city manager. >> Thank you, mayor and good morning mayor and city council. [9:01:35 AM] I'm pleased to bring forward today, for your consideration, a four year collective bargaining agreement with the Austin firefighter association. After returning to the negotiation table to resolve the issues raised in their proposed charter amendment. I believe we have arrived at a true and complete agreement for the next four years contained within the city's agrees to maintain the mandatory four person staffing ordinance through mutual agreement with the FAA, the afa Wu. In exchange, the afa agrees to no longer pursue its charter petition. As has always been our stated goal, this agreement ensures the city continues to deploy resources to serve our residents in the most effective manner, avoids excessive overtime to ensure our firefighters have time to rest, and provides a reduced work week hours to improve firefighter work life balance [9:02:35 AM] so that they can benefit from the much needed rest. With that, I will turn it over to Roxie Perez Stephens, deputy labor relations officer, to explain the agreement in more detail. >> Good morning, mayor and council. Thank you. City manager Broadnax Roxie Stephens deputy labor relations officer I'm excited to be here because this means that we have been able to get back to the table and resolve the outstanding issues that we already had. As you recall, we already had a to with resolved issues. We were able to go back to the table with the afa on the unresolved issues raised by the petition for the charter amendment, and we are presenting to you today an agreement between both the city and the afa. After negotiations. So after returning to the table, we negotiated this agreement. This is the first fire agreement that we have actually negotiated and brought before the city council without going through another process, such [9:03:35 AM] as arbitration since 2017. So this is a this this is a good thing. We are forging a new collaborative effort in working with the afa to achieve resolution to difficult issues so that we can discuss them, discuss the real issues, and come up with reasonable, effective and practical solutions. So the agreement that I'm bringing forth today before the mayor and the council resolves all the issues we and in resolving all the issues we've been able to achieve a lot. If you look across the state, maybe maybe they're able to achieve wage increases, or maybe they're able to achieve a reduced work week and just that, or a new shift schedule in the agreement that we're bringing forth today, we're able to achieve all of those we've been able to to achieve increased wages for all our our hard working firefighters, reduce workweek hours to address the health and safety of the firefighters [9:04:36 AM] themselves. We've committed to four person staffing levels and solidifying the quality of the services that we're able to provide our community, and we also discussed when hard issues come up, how are we going to deal with them? We have formed collaborative processes in order to be able to address those issues in collaboration with the afa, and which may at times allow the city to consider taking apparatus and fire stations out of service, but only in critical moments and only in certain circumstances. The agreement that I'm bringing forth today has been approved by the afa by 72% of their membership. They voted in favor, and that's a strong vote. There is a powerpoint presentation included in the public backup documents that I have uploaded for this particular agenda item that outlines all the details of the complete tentative agreement. If I went through all the through all the details, [9:05:37 AM] as you see, the the agreement itself is about 110 pages. It is very complex and there's a lot of details. So I've included that powerpoint presentation that outlines all of those for everyone's reference the mayor, the council, the public, anybody who wants to look at it. So I'm not going to go through each slide there, but I'm going to highlight the major key points that we've been able to achieve in this agreement. This agreement is a four year agreement being becoming effective today in ending in September 2029. It includes an enhanced hiring process where the chief gets to set the hiring standards and has more flexibility to hold continuous hiring processes and be able to focus on certain geographical areas, meaning that we can have multiple tests happening at the same time in different locations rather than just one test, it opens it up to a lot more applicants than we have had before. The chief will also be able to utilize modified [9:06:38 AM] hiring to hire quickly and hire already certified firefighters from other jurisdictions. It also offers a streamlined promotional process for the firefighters that are within the rank and file. To be able to move up, within and promote within their ranks. The contract that we're presenting today allows the chief to utilize non-sworn employees in certain sections of the department, including recruiting, public information and er shop, and it continues to allow the use of civilian engineers and fire prevention. A big component of this, which is very transformative, is something that we have negotiated called the Austin schedule, beginning the third year of the contract. And the reason that it's in the third year of the contract is because the firefighters or the afa membership has collaborated with us to understand that it's going to take some work to get to be able to implement that schedule, that there's two distinct items in the Austin [9:07:39 AM] schedule. One is the actual shift schedule itself, which which goes from a 2448 and transforms into a13, two, three, meaning there's a three days in between each shift. So firefighter will have time to rest and spend time with their family. And that would be one day on, three days off, two days on, three days off, and continuous such as that in addition to the new shift schedule. Oh, and before I move on to that, there will be a an alternative shift schedule of the 2448 that would be available for people with hardships, such as taking care of children or family members or other hardships. And that would be on an as request basis and as approved by the fire chief. In addition to the new shift schedule, there's also going to be reduced workweek hours throughout the course of this contract. The reduced workweek will go from an average of 52 down to 49.8 there. In year three of the contract. There is a a point in [9:08:41 AM] the contract in March of 2026, where the firefighters have agreed as a cost sharing measure, to give back the two Kelly days that they they were awarded in the last contract award, in order to be able to use those savings to fund additional fees to implement the reduced work workweek schedule. When when they do implement the 49.8 hour work schedule in the third year of the contract, that actually increases the hourly wage by 6.43%, meaning they're going to be making more hourly but making the same annual rate. And then the raises that we did negotiate go on top of that. The 54 oh, part of the cost sharing process that the afa has agreed to participate in is to add 54 additional ftes into the authorized strength of firefighters in order to be able to implement the reduced work schedule. That would be, the city would increase the [9:09:43 AM] authorized strength in year one by 22 firefighters and year two by 32 firefighters. That way, in the third year of the contract we have hired or we are, we have increased the authorized strength up to 54 additional firefighters. Part of the cost sharing. Also, the firefighters have also agreed to give up the sick leave buyback program, and that savings was also attributed to the sharing in the cost of of hiring those additional firefighters. Now for wage increases, we're also able to adjust the pay scale. In year one, we had noticed in our compensation study and in discussions with the afa that the entry level firefighter steps were the ones that were a little lagging behind and needed a little bit more. A little bit more attention. So what we did was we took the pay scale and we adjusted it accordingly. Throughout the [9:10:44 AM] different steps in the ranks. So there is a graduated increase as the steps go forward. The entry level step of zero or the, which is the step in which firefighters who are coming in from probation and what attracts firefighters to apply to the city of Austin is being raised by 6.21%. The step one, which is one year experience, is increased by 5.5 5.55%. And the step two, which is two years experience, is increased by 5.06%. All other firefighters will experience a 3.96% increase in the first year, and the battalion chiefs and division chiefs will will get a 3% increase. One of the things we also did was we made all rank differentials, meaning the differences between the ranks, and we made them a stable 8%. For years two, three and four of the contract were also able to achieve increases. [9:11:44 AM] Year two would be an across the board increase of 3%, year three would be 3.5% and year four would be 4%. The projected cost of the agreement over the four years is $63 million, with the year one cost of $5,913,706. The contract also includes guardrail provisions regarding funding and the availability of funding. Now, the outstanding issues that we added to the tentative agreement here in the last month that we took to negotiate the contract or the outstanding issues with the issues being raised by the petition for the charter amendment, are the four person staffing. The reason that gave rise was because the afe had filed a petition to seek to have the four person staffing solidified in a charter amendment by including it in the contract, the afe has agreed not to pursue or support, [9:12:44 AM] directly or indirectly, any charter, amendment and or law that addresses the four person staffing ordinance, the fire department, staffing levels, minimum staffing for apparatuses or apparatuses in service and out of service, or fire stations in service or out of service. In return, the city has agreed in the contract that it will not amend, revise or rescind the four person staffing ordinance requiring four person staffing. There is also an additional provision that if any outside party or any law or charter amendment is enacted during the term of the agreement that the city council may vote to expire the contract if it impacts the ability to fund or manage or or administer the contract, and then the contractor would be required to be renegotiated. With four person staffing. It mirrors the ordinance. It references the ordinance, but there were some [9:13:45 AM] clarifications and misunderstandings, or rather clarifications, and under mutual understandings that we had to include in the contract. That way we made sure we're all in agreement, and we included those in the contract. Some of those things were unforeseen staffing shortages, when what can we do and what can the city do then? And flexibilities that were included in the four person staffing ordinance and the ability to to revise and modify, for instance, a general order that is referenced in the in the current ordinance, being able to modify and update it as needed as the environment and the circumstances changed. We've also included in the process in the contract collaborative processes that include considerations to revisions of the four person staffing ordinance. If if brought up by either the city or the afa, and taking apparatus or fire stations out of service during citywide severe financial crisis or department level unforeseen budget issues, there is [9:14:46 AM] specific criteria that is included in the contract in which these items can occur, but there is a collaborative process that has been set up and been agreed to by the city and the afa that would result in a in a, a solution or a resolution to those issues, those difficult issues, should they occur. In addition to the this item, there's two companion agenda items related to the agreement. If the agreement is approved, one would be the budget amendment to move the funding from one fund, from one fund to the department fund and the set the second agenda item, which that would be agenda item two. Agenda item three would be to increase the authorized strength by those 22 ftes for this one year. This agreement improves improves the fire department. It achieves stability and mutual understandings for the next four years, and it addresses the health and wellness of the firefighters and solidifies [9:15:46 AM] high quality fire services for our community. This is a trailblazing contract and very transformative, and we're excited to present it to the city council for consideration as a true and complete agreement of all of the issues. We are recommending that the city council approve this tentative agreement, and I stand by for any questions that you may have. >> Thank you, miss Davis. Members. If you have questions, if you'll let me know by hitting your light, I would appreciate that. Before we do that, before I call on anybody, I think I speak for everybody when we say how pleased we are. And with your your excellent work and your team and all of the people that have been a part of this, we're very appreciative of the effort and creativity and work that you put into it. With that. Members. Questions. Council member Siegel. Thank you, mayor. And yes, thank you very much to miss Stevens and staff for this presentation. Thank you for all of your work. Also, thank you to the awesome firefighters association for your work on this. For all of you bringing [9:16:48 AM] us this proposed agreement that would bring the city long term stability, where all of the issues are decided together, where we are improving compensation, pay equity across a firefighters career. We're improving the schedule, addressing firefighter wellness. We're addressing job safety through four person staffing. And we're also avoiding a protracted struggle Wright and a ballot measure campaign. So this is an agreement that would bring us labor peace and promote stability in our public safety programs and hopefully build goodwill among the ranks. I guess before we get to the vote a little bit later, I want to ask a couple questions, I guess first, and I see our cfo is online virtually, but I guess if city staff could explain how we would pay for overtime related to maintaining four person staffing in the way it's enshrined in this agreement. >> Is Lang you want to do that or Mr. Veneno? >> Terry, I'll let you go. [9:17:50 AM] >> Thanks, Ed. >> Good morning. >> Kerri Lang, director of budget and organizational excellence. And to speak to the overtime cost for this year with this agreement. I think it is the plan and we've already started working on how we would make those adjustments. But there are administrative adjustments that the the chief will make as we look at this, this, this current fiscal year, I think we're all committed to supporting the department with this agreement. And so as we work closely with the department from a budget and organizational excellence perspective, we'll do monthly check ins to see how they're over. Overtime is trending as well as look at what administrative changes we can make as we go through the year. It's going to be an ongoing conversation and looking throughout, you know, the general fund as a whole to see what savings is generated just on natural work. And then we'll we'll look at how we need to [9:18:51 AM] adjust this fiscal year as we and then begin to plan for next fiscal year. >> Wonderful. Thank you. Director. My next question relates to, I guess, article 34, section three a, and this is the subsection of the agreement that allows the chief financial officer of the city to define terms like severe financial crisis. And that would impact, I guess, some of the ability to maybe adjust something like four person staffing. And so I want to ask the cfo if he could explain a little bit. I mean, obviously we don't know if this provision will ever be triggered and it will be up to the cfo at that point. It would be triggered to to make the certification. So we're not asking for a kind of a binding ruling, but I would like to ask if Mr. Van van eenoo could explain how he would approach defining a term like severe financial crisis in the context of the cba. >> Sure. Thank you. Council member Ed Benigno, chief financial officer for the city. And you may recall, we had a [9:19:52 AM] similar discussion around the the contract we have with the Austin police association and the interpretation of language in that contract. And, you know, my, my, my point at that time is I think it's really going to depend upon the circumstances at the the time of the financial situation we might be looking at. So, you know, a couple examples, I can tell you, I was here in fiscal years 2008, 2009, when we had the financial crisis, and we had a very steep reduction in property or sales tax revenues that year, I believe we had projected a 5% increase and we ended up having a 10% decrease. So at the time, that was about a $30 million shift in revenue, and we had to make rapid adjustments to our budget in order to react to that. And I think that would be a situation that certainly was a financial crisis that required immediate action. And maybe somewhat surprisingly, though, you look at the 2020 covid situation, and as dramatic as that event was, and [9:20:53 AM] as impactful as that event was on the city's economy, with the strong federal response and federal stimulus, financially, that was not a crisis on the same order of magnitude as what we experienced during the financial issues we the country, had back in 2009. You know, some other examples might be, you know, this year we're able to get through a budget that back in April, we forecasted a $33 million deficit. And with a lot of belt tightening and some tough decisions, we were able to get through that. I certainly think if you were to look at a budget that maybe because of a 3.5% revenue cap, where we continue to have budget gaps in the future, you know, the more years in a row that you have to deal with a 20, $30 million deficit, the more and more difficult that's going to be. So just just to say perhaps a 10 or $20 million deficit one year might not be a crisis, but 2 or 3 years consecutively it could become a crisis. So I think there's lots of examples like that I could [9:21:55 AM] go through. But, you know, really until we see the situation in front of us and it's not just for myself, for a prospective future, cfo is going to have to make these determinations. And I think for all those factors, that's why it's not defined in the contract more tangibly, such as, you know, I don't know, a 2% reduction in revenue would trigger this provision. I don't think it's that simplistic. It does require some interpretation and some judgment. And that's what the contract allows the cfo to do. >> Thank you sir. Yeah. And obviously I think we all hope we can avoid this eventuality through our diligent efforts. And I guess the last question, not so much for the cfo, is just an issue that was brought to my office about parental leave for firefighters. My understanding. Page 32, section 22 of the cba says that entitlements preempt the entitlements in this agreement, preempt the city of Austin's personnel policies regarding parental leave benefits. And so if one of y'all could parental leave benefits [9:22:56 AM] are still maintained in this agreement. >> I would have to. >> If you give me a moment, I would have to look in the contract to. I don't remember what the parental leave on that is. Okay. >> That's fine. >> I can give me a moment. Council member. >> Thank you. That's all I have. Mayor. >> Great. Thank you. Councilmember. Siegel. Councilmember harper-madison, councilmember Ellis and mayor pro tem. >> Mister mayor, appreciate it. Thank you for the presentation. Excuse me. Exceedingly happy to hear that we're going to be able to maintain the national average of the four person staffing. You know, what best practices have been established. And with no opportunity for that to be eroded. That's something I'm happy to see, and glad to see that we were able to negotiate in good faith and and offer some continuity of service to our constituents and operational stability. I think the two questions I have, one is about recruitment, but I [9:23:56 AM] think as you're feverishly searching for an answer to councilmember Segal's question, I can move to one that miss Lang might be able to answer. I'm curious to know if approving this contract provides. The opportunity or I'm sorry. Looking ahead at approving the contract, what metrics should council should be? Should we be tracking over the lifetime of the contract to ensure or understand rather its impact on service levels and response times? Actually, I think that's a that's not a new question at all, is it? Mr. Mayor, would you like for me to just hold. >> That probably until. Okay. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for that. Councilmember. Councilmember Ellis. And followed by the mayor pro tem. >> I just want to make sure if [9:24:58 AM] I'm asking questions. >> Yeah. >> Won't have a question for budget. >> Okay. Mayor pro tem. >> Thank you. Can we put up the slide? It's the last slide on your slide deck. Miss Stevens, on the financial forecast for the next five years. And part of what I want to talk about is my understanding of the value of this contract is around 62 million, 66 million over the next over the terms of the contract. Correct? >> Correct. >> Okay. And with this on the slide you have it's the second to last slide on that one. You have our five year average annual revenue growth at a 3.3%, and our expenditure growth at a 3.9%. And so just wanted to see if you could speak to the structural deficit that we will be facing with the city budget in the coming years. >> Yes. As we as we've talked about through our forecast and our budget processes, the city [9:25:59 AM] again, with the 3.5% property tax revenue cap, we rely heavily on sales tax revenue to help us balance the budget year over year. And as we've seen, our sales tax revenue decline, we recognize that our expenditure growth as a whole is growing faster than what we're anticipating our revenue growth to come in at. We watch our sales tax revenue closely to try to make sure we are giving the best projections, with still being a little bit conservative because of how volatile the the that revenue source is. But I'll say that when we in this forecast, going back to our forecast in April, we anticipate the cost of this contract. It was included in all of our projections and the team, Roxie and her team, as well as working with the association, have come up with [9:26:59 AM] a contract that is in line with what we plan for and budgeted for. I do think that when we're looking at this deficit, it does include us moving forward to getting the reserves back to a 17% by fiscal year 30. And so that is one of the things you see in this 30, 34 and $38 million deficit, us anticipating doing the work to get there. And so that increases the amount of the deficit given where we are with our sales tax revenue projections right now. >> Very good. Thank you. >> Thanks, mayor pro tem, I'm going to see if you can answer councilmember Siegel's question. And then we will go to councilmember back to councilmember harper-madison. >> Yes, mayor. The paid parental leave benefit and aspect is actually not codified in the actual agreement. And that's why I couldn't recall it, because it's not in the agreement, but the chief has the ability to manage that accordingly. And my understanding is that the chief has memorandums out to the members, to the firefighters, that regarding the paid [9:28:02 AM] parental leave benefit and addressing that. >> Okay. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Thank you, councilmember Siegel. Now, councilmember harper-madison, I'll come back to you and then we'll go to councilmember Ellis, followed by councilmember vela. >> Thank you, I appreciate it. And if I had a question about overtime savings by way of the 53 hour workweek, would that be miss Lang or would that be fire? >> I'll take a stab. >> Okay. I'm just curious to know, how do we how do we quantify the overtime savings with the with the increase or with the change in the the 53 hour workweek? >> So I as we're looking at the overtime cost and it's an analysis that we're going to have to continue to do even as we because of the nuances of it. There are variables such as the number of staff that are in place, the the average pay for those staff. So there are a number of variables that will work closely with the [9:29:02 AM] department to anticipate, to to finish analyzing. But I think as we look at their overtime costs, we will make those adjustments in in the coming budgets for adjusting based on their reduced work week and which will ultimately increase their hourly rate. Correct. And so we'll look at those adjustments. I do not anticipate because of the increased position. So there are 22 additional positions that would be added that would offset the need for some of that overtime, because those are additional bodies would be used for for Aleve usage and things like that. So I think there's there's some work that we're going to continue to do as this is implemented. But I my, my guess is that the impact would not be a major impact. >> I appreciate that, and I think you answered the second question, which would have been, you know, how much of the cost is attributable to pay adjustments versus the addition of the 22 positions? So I think [9:30:02 AM] you answered that question. I think the only other question I would have that's budget related is can we confirm that these funds are fully offset within the existing general fund or and don't rather create any new structural pressures? >> Yes. The team did an amazing job. We and the team being Roxie and her team, we worked really closely to make sure that as this agreement was created, that it remained within the assumptions that we had available for the budget. And so there are no added costs beyond what we what we assumed for this, for this contract. >> I appreciate it. And looking ahead, what should council be tracking to ensure that the staffing additions are really translating into measurable service and response benefits? Is that a fair question? >> I think I would rely on the fire department for that detail [9:31:02 AM] of the implementation, but we plan we being the budget organizational excellence plan, to work closely with the department to really look at their expenditures and and how they're trending throughout the year. That's going to we're starting that now, but that will continue through the implementation of the Austin schedule and the contract. >> And, you know, I think to that point, you were saying, you know, the analysis is ongoing. It's sort of a fluid process. And so I think that's one of those things that as the process goes, we'll be able to determine what to track more closely. Correct. Thank you I appreciate it. Thank you. So back up to my fire question. One of them was, you know, from a recruitment and retention standpoint, is that chief okay. I want to know how does this agreement position Austin relative to other major Texas cities, peer cities from a recruitment perspective? [9:32:02 AM] >> Tovo assistant chief Austin fire. One of the things I think that this does is putting that new schedule in place separates us from other departments, and I think that's a big deal. And I think that will be very helpful in our recruiting efforts. We do have a plan in place to be able to fill three cadet classes prior to the October 1st, 2027 date of the implementation of the new schedule, and so we hope to be fully staffed and have everything in place ready to go. And I do think that the obviously the the pay raises are substantial. And, you know, the new schedule gives us something to offer the other departments don't offer. There's not any big cities in Texas that have a schedule like this right now. So I think it's I think that's probably the biggest win for us from recruiting standpoint. >> It's interesting. I was thinking, you know, I know a lot of our firefighters drive in to Austin, don't necessarily live in Austin proper. So that one, three, two, three I think will definitely benefit the ones who are commuting into town a great deal. Absolutely. Thinking about, you know, the [9:33:02 AM] impact of affordability in the city, it's unfortunate, but more and more of our public service, you know, public servants rather are not going to live in Austin proper. So I think that one, three, two, three will help a ton. And then just with, you know, recognizing there is some degree of pressure on families when you're 24, 48. The one question I had about the exceptions, by request for the 2448 due to hardship. I'm just wondering if you anticipate any sort of delay, you know, will people be stuck with the one, three, two, three until the approval of the 2448? >> I don't think so. I'm sorry, if you don't mind. I don't think so. Because we have time. We have time to get that in place prior to the implementation of that schedule. >> Awesome. Thank you. And then do. I think that might have been all of my questions for you guys? And well, actually, you know, you said something when you were talking about. [9:34:05 AM] Filling three cadet classes. You know, I remember there was a time where there was a test for AFD and there were like 6000 applicants. I'm just curious to know, has there been an increase or a decrease in submission of applications? >> Things have changed, have stayed consistent over the past three processes. We've had between 6 and 800 applicants. When we've taken applications. I do anticipate that our next round of of applications, when we take them again in about 18 months, we'll, we'll, we'll we'll see the benefits of this contract and hope that, you know, us being stable with the contract and having this new schedule to offer should increase our recruiting numbers. >> I appreciate that. I think those are the kinds of things that, you know, when we have those updates and, you know, when we get our presentations, you know, those are the kinds of updates I think would be important for the council to to hear about. Thank you. I appreciate you. >> Thank you. Councilmember. Councilmember, followed by councilmember vela. >> Thank you. Mayor, I have a [9:35:05 AM] question about the blackout and brownout risk for some stations. So in 2018, the city council codified four person staffing on the trucks. Around that same time, city council approved funding to build five new fire and ems stations. Can you talk to me about the process of if that conversation is going to be had? What is the strategy to figure out which stations or which shifts might see a blackout or a brownout? >> So for a brownout, which which means taking an apparatus or a fire station out of service, either temporarily or for a longer period of time, the contract identifies two scenarios where the city is allowed to do that, and that is a city wide financial crisis whereby it has to be declared and defined by the cfo as. And that is, if the cfo declares that there's a severe financial crisis that impairs the city's [9:36:05 AM] ability to provide essential police, fire and ems services. So in that context, when there is a consideration of a brownout, so to say, or taking apparatus or fire stations out of service, then there's a joint labor management committee that will convene, comprised of three members of the city and three members of the afa to discuss options, length of closure, where it's going to happen, how it's going to happen so that we make sure to mitigate any effect that such a closure or taking out of service would have. And then once that recommendation has been either approved, has been approved, and the decision has been made, then there is a public advisory agenda item that the city will notify not only the city council, but also the afa of the closures, the reasons for the closures and what the recommendation was and how that was implemented. We also have the ability to consider that as one of the options. If there is a department level budget, [9:37:07 AM] significant budget reduction necessary for unforeseen circumstances that were not considered at the time of a budget adoption. Again, that is another very significant event. It's not something that happens all the time. So then that's one of the options that that could be considered, along with all a lot of other kind of budget reductions to keep the management of the fire department budget within what it is approved. And in that case, again, the same kind of joint labor management committee does convene. It's a shall convene in order to figure out recommendations on how to make those budget reductions. And if it if one of the recommendations considers taking an apparatus or fire station out of service, then we do the same thing. That decision is made, and then the notification is made in a public meeting as an advisory agenda item to the city council. And we also give notice to the afa. One of the things that we're we were concerned with and wanted to address in the contract were, number one, recognizing that there are [9:38:09 AM] times that the city will need to consider that in times of dire need. And then, number two, that the city remains accountable when those closures or taking them out of service has to happen, and that it's transparent that everybody knows about it and knows what is happening and why. >> So we will know when those conversations are beginning at least. So it's not just a surprise that a meeting happened. And there was a decision made in that meeting. >> Yes. That's correct. The circumstances by which these are options are circumstances that don't don't come to fruition overnight. It's something that that is not necessarily going to be a surprise. >> Okay. I'd certainly hope that we could be kept apprized if those conversations begin just because we'll get questions and we want to be able to answer them responsibly to our constituents. I'll just make my position known on on some of the blackout brownout conversations is a lot of the new fire stations that were built over the past seven years are in high wildfire areas that [9:39:09 AM] previously had slow, slower response times. So I really want to make sure that we're not taking those new ones out of rotation. There was one in southwest Austin that is fantastic, and it is near the entrance of a neighborhood that had one of the slowest response times in the city in that moment, and it has very limited ingress egress and backs up to the greenbelt. So I really want to make sure that we're not taking the new ones out, because I think there's a very good reason that those stations were built, and I think they are providing a great service to to the areas that they're being able to assist with. My other question is going to be about the pay increases, specifically, when exactly do those take effect, and is there any retroactivity to some of the pay increases? >> No. To account for the delay of the effective date of this contract, we have agreed to a lump sum payment that is calculated taking into consideration when calculated up to January 10th of 2026. All [9:40:11 AM] of the effective pay raises and all other monetary items and leave accruals that are agreed to and increased in the contract become effective. The pay period beginning January 11th of 2026. But the the period before we have agreed that it would be covered by a lump sum of $1,100 per year per firefighter. >> Okay. >> And then my last question, I know there was one about parental leave earlier. I know there is some specific adjustments that are made for individuals that are pregnant or have had a baby that may be slightly different than parental leave for either parent. Those are still outside of this contract, right? Those are still up to the chief's direction, that if they have someone who has delivered a baby, that they are not necessarily back on a truck in 12 weeks, for instance. >> Yes, that is correct. >> Okay. They have a little extra time and they are able to provide some level of service to the fire department. That is not necessarily on an apparatus. >> That's correct. >> Okay. Great. Thank you very [9:41:12 AM] much. >> Thank you. Councilmember. Councilmember vela. >> Thank you very much. And to start off just again, thank you to all involved, the the fire association and to the labor negotiating team and staff for coming to this agreement. I think it's a it's a good agreement and I look forward to, to voting for it here soon. Just a couple of quick questions. You know, with the police, we have really tried to take an approach where we are. Trying to keep police in the core kind of functions of what their work does and trying to anything we can shift to kind of a civilian employee or a non kind of a police department employee. We've been kind of moving in that direction and thinking about the the fire department again, with the overtime costs and the staffing issues and concerns, the [9:42:12 AM] inspections, the fire department inspections have been an ongoing concern that the contractors and others kind of in the in the building trades have have raised. And I just wanted to ask what the how the contract in terms of the providing inspections, where are we in terms of whose responsibility is it, who is allowed to do those inspections? What how is how does that look under the contract. >> So under the contract for the use of civilians for fire prevention, the language stays the same as it has been for a couple of contracts. And that is that prior fire prevention duties shall be performed by firefighters, except that degreed engineers who are civilian employees may be assigned fire prevention duties. And the reason that is in there is because chapter 143, when it defines firefighter, also defines that firefighters who perform fire prevention should be sworn. And that's why we included in the contract to allow the flexibility for the [9:43:14 AM] degreed engineers who are civilian employees. With regard to what the degreed engineers or the civilian employees do, is, I think that I believe that they do technical reviews of plans and that the rest of the fire inspection is done by sworn employees. >> Yeah. And I completely agree and understand, especially when we're talking about actual fire equipment, you know, the sprinkler testing and the water pressure controls, those kinds of things like that, in particular with the wui, that has created a lot of much more kind of small scale inspections that are, for example, the making sure that the, the there's not vegetation within a certain area around the house, making sure that I believe that there's mesh in all the openings to prevent any embers from from entering the home and starting a fire. Are we allowed to use any kind of civilian employees? Because I understand [9:44:15 AM] in that that there are there is a provision in there that civilians are allowed to assist with the the wui inspections. What's the situation with that? >> Tom vokey, assistant chief Austin fire. So right now the the actual inspections on new construction are still conducted by firefighters. There are size evaluations and other things that are done that are non formal inspections that are currently done by civilians. But all the all the fire inspections in the wui for new construction are currently still done as a part of the fire code with the wui code under the same provisions that that exist here. >> And how do you all feel about the staffing and the ability to get those inspections done in a in a timely manner? Because I know that, again, we're in a lull right now, especially on the on the housing construction front. But again, the real estate cycle comes and goes. And [9:45:17 AM] that's been and again, not just with the fire department but across the board permitting and kind of inspection delays have been a point of, of of concern from a lot of folks perspective and can affect housing costs. How are you feeling about staffing? >> I mean, I feel pretty good about the way things in chief de la Rosa is here. Also, who's over fire prevention right now. But, you know, in my time as the fire marshal's office, we implemented the code, got the inspectors in place and, you know, got them out there. And I felt like that we had a reasonable, a reasonable plan. And we had a reasonable response when we were getting the code inspections done. Again, it being something new, we've got better at it along the way. So I feel like we're in a good spot now to be able to conduct inspections in a timely manner and and get them done reasonably. >> Okay. Great, great. And I was looking at and I think it's it's article 19, section eight where it says that civilians working in the wildfire management division may perform and then has community outreach and education, administer programs, provide training, [9:46:18 AM] conduct wildfire prevention. So my my I again I'm not don't didn't delve into the great details. But I feel like that kind of cracks the door open for the potential use of civilian employees as, as part of the the Wu inspections. >> Well, I mean, it's it's different because they're doing community, community service related things and community engagement things, and they're also doing they're doing inspections that are not certified inspections on construction. And that's the main difference is that when they're out there doing inspections, they're making recommendations to to the homeowners or the business owners. When we're doing inspections, we are inspecting for code violations and code compliance. And so that's the the thing that separates the two. >> All right. Well, look forward to to following up on these conversations in the in the months to come. But thank you for the clarifications. >> Yes, sir. >> Thank you, councilmember members. We'll now go to [9:47:18 AM] speakers and I'll turn to the city clerk. As soon as we've completed the speakers, we I will call for a motion on item number one, and we're calling for the speakers on item number one. >> Thank you, mayor, for item one. We have Bob nix, and he has time donated from Christine Jones and David Gerrard. Christine, David, are you here? >> They are. >> You have six minutes. >> Okay. Well. >> First of all, council, thank you for being here. It's our pleasure to speak before you today. And thank you for taking time away from your family and loved ones to help us get this over the finish line. It is very much appreciated. I think this agreement is a good deal for both labor and management, not just in what's written in the words, but over the last 6 to 8 months we've ended, I think, a long standing, very amicable relationship between [9:48:19 AM] labor and management. And it wasn't easy getting here, right. It became clear to us during the budget process that four person staffing was going to be reversed. You guys adopted a budget that takes $8.3 million out of the fire department budget, and the only way to get there was to then reverse the ordinance. It was very clear that was happening when I called council, there were some frustrations, but also was reading the tea leaves. It was going to be reversed. That same base budget was approved after prop Q, so when we launched the safe officer petition, we didn't do it in anger. We did it in protection of the firefighters, and the citizens were sworn to serve. And I do think this agreement, the promises made in this agreement and the relationships may be more important, the relationships we can build, because this agreement can really allow us to collaborate in the future and provide the flexibility, management needs [9:49:19 AM] and council needs to make these tough decisions in in periods of severe financial crisis. When during the excuse me, November 20th work session, there was a lot of comments made from staff and council. Some I didn't agree with, but I listened really carefully and there were some really good guidance in what was said. And that guidance, especially from councilmember alter, you really brought up the term. And what does impaired mean? Is it a dollar is $1 million? And it got us thinking that, you know, in a crisis you can't be wondering those sort of things. Management needs to have the authority to do those sort of things. But then we also need protections in our side to make sure things just don't happen, because it's easy and expedient in the budget, which we felt was happening. So that's why we launched it. Right? But listening to the words in that work session, we tried to work out an agreement that provides management council, the authority's, to to have this [9:50:20 AM] sort of flexibility in these cases of extreme emergencies and rare catastrophic events, but provides the firefighters and the citizens protection they need to make sure operating safe and be able to do our job, that people are sworn to protect. And I think that's what this agreement does. However, there's some there's some things in the agreement that were discussed at the table we want to talk about here, because they kind of set a benchmark or level and we trigger some of these events. And so I brought up David Gerard, if you have met David yet, he is our president elect for afar. I'll be swearing him in on the 13th. He's much more reasonable than me. So you guys should get along really well. But so when we talk about four person staffing, it should never be triggered ever. Reduction of four person staffing under this current agreement, unless there's a rare catastrophic emergency. And some of the examples of that were there's such a bad snowstorm that we can't get firefighters to work. So this should never be triggered, ever, you know, except in these except in some of this bona [9:51:21 AM] fide, rare, catastrophic emergency and the shutting down of fire stations and apparatus. There's two conditions which Roxy laid out really well. One is a citywide crisis, and the other one is an unforeseen financial crisis in the fire department budget. So we got one in front of us right now, I would call it not unforeseen. That's what I want to that's I want to highlight it. When we sign this agreement, the fire department will be in deficit, $8.3 million and they cannot make it up. It's not possible. We know that because we tried to make it up by moving 42 people from staff to operations to save money. We saved very little money doing that for the period of time we tried it. There's no there's no meat on the bone on the fire department budget. So this is not an unforeseen crisis. Once you sign this agreement, it is a gap that needs to be made up. The best efforts of the fire chief cannot make up that much money. The fire department, it's going to have to come from somewhere. So I'm just trying to be realistic here, you know? So that is not an unforeseen [9:52:23 AM] crisis, an unforeseen crisis. And I brought David here to describe some of these things. He was at the table and he brought up some of these examples. David, if you don't mind going over the brownout or the station shutdown apparatus discussions at the table, why this is important, discussions at the table of bargaining, creative bargaining history that the arbitrator will consider if it ever goes to some sort of arbitration. So David, you could describe those please. >> As both Roxy David Gerard, president elect, Austin firefighters association as both Roxy and Bob has referenced, there is a provision within article 34 that speaks to unforeseen budget issues at the department level. And so we did have conversations at the table and away from the table, because we saw the wisdom in trying to better understand what some examples might be that would justify that trigger. And it was Roxy with Stevens, with the labor relations that kind of offered up two examples that we have kind of a shared agreement on, and one of them was a [9:53:24 AM] protracted, extensive wildfire season that required for the fire chief to up staff wildfire apparatus over an extended period of time that was unprecedented and in excess of what our historical norms were. Second example would be another covid like event in which we could have excessive vacancies by firefighters due to illness or injury that, again, were greatly exceeded. What our our normal leave patterns are. And those are two examples that were discussed that would be an unforeseen budget issue that was not known at the time of the initial budget adoption. And so we appreciate her offering those things at the table and away from the table. And we wanted to put them on record here this morning. >> Thank you, president elect Gerard. Thank you both. >> Brief follow up question. >> Sure. >> Mr. Gerard, did you have a chance to finish your statement? >> I did, thank you. >> All right. Thank you, mayor. >> Thank you all. Thank you. And your for the contract, right? Pardon me. You're for the contract? [9:54:25 AM] >> Yes. >> Okay. >> It's rare that I endorse a. >> Contract, I understand. >> I endorse. >> It, that's why I'm asking the question. >> I think it really does satisfy the promises that we try to get. >> Very good. Thank you. >> For item two. We have. >> We're not going to go to item two just yet. That completes all the speakers on item number one members. Item number one is the approval of an execution of a four year collective bargaining agreement with the Austin firefighters association. A motion is made by councilmember Velazquez, seconded by councilmember harper-madison. Discussion on the motion. Mayor pro tem followed by councilmember alter. >> Thank you. >> Councilmember Laine. >> We know the number one priority of our council is and has always been the safety of austinites that we serve. This agreement is a major and exciting step forward in that mission. It not only delivers a competitive pay package, but it also sets a promising new national standard for firefighter scheduling, ensuring our first responders [9:55:25 AM] are well rested, that they are resilient and that they're ready to serve our communities. Securing four person staffing is also a historic achievement that will keep our community safer, while protecting the health and well-being of our firefighters. And what I find most promising is that for the first time in years, all of our public safety departments are now under robust contracts. This gives us much needed foundation of stability and trust to build upon, allowing us to move forward with a clear focus on responsiveness, accountability, safety and long term planning. I know that reaching this agreement was no easy feat, so I'm deeply grateful to our firefighters, to our labor negotiation teams. Congratulations, miss Stevens, and all of your hard work and leadership and everyone who worked tirelessly to bring this agreement across the finish line. I look forward to support to continue supporting our firefighters and our shared mission of keeping austinites safe. >> Thank you, mayor pro tem councilmember alter, followed by councilmember Laine, then councilmember Siegel. [9:56:25 AM] >> Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Just want to start off with what I know will be an echo of. Thanks, miss Stevens. Mr. Desai back there, I know, y'all, I see Lowell there. Y'all. Y'all worked really hard on this. And so I really appreciate the work that was done. And I and I want to thank take a moment. Our the outgoing president of afe who has this is not your first rodeo. Appreciate the work you've done advocating on behalf of the fire department, the fire association and Mr. Gerard, look forward to getting to work with you in the coming future. I think this deal is very much a a compromise, a a deal that is exactly what is envisioned by collective bargaining. No side gets everything it wants, but it is a really good agreement for the people of Austin and for our firefighters. You know, we are raising pay, especially in those early ranks, so we can [9:57:26 AM] attract more people. We are going to this new schedule, which is, as we heard today, going to be really key in getting more applicants and hopefully more firefighters here in Austin to provide the level of safety that our residents deserve. And we're going to do it in a way that preserves for person staffing and does all the things that we need to keep austinites safe. So I just want to thank everyone involved for getting us here. I know it wasn't always easy, and there were moments where it didn't seem like we might get here, but I really appreciate the hard work. >> Thank you. Councilmember. Councilmember Laine. Councilmember Siegel. Then councilmember harper-madison. >> Thank you. First, I absolutely want to thank deputy labor relations officer Stevens and her team for the steady hand that you've brought to the entire contract negotiation process. Thank you also to direct budget director Carrie Lang for the critical and timely support that you and your team always bring to these process processes, and the [9:58:28 AM] consistency and skill that I've been so pleased to experience throughout this first year in office. And also, thank you very much to the leadership who returned to the table in good faith so that we could arrive at an agreement that serves firefighter needs while reducing financial risk for the city. I'm gratified that we are voting today on a contract that has received strong support from afar, and that we are ending this process in a way that brings us together as a city, supports our firefighters in terms of both pay and rest, and that significantly improves AFD's ability to recruit and retain firefighters so that we can fill these positions while providing needed clarity on key aspects of financial risk. I'm very pleased to join outgoing president Bob nix in supporting this contract. Thank you. >> Thank you. Councilmember. Councilmember Siegel. Councilmember harper-madison. Councilmember qadri. >> Thank you, mayor. And I definitely want to keep celebrating everyone working together. Firefighters, city council. I even enjoyed our quorum. This is my first [9:59:29 AM] collective bargaining agreement process. So thanks y'all for including me. But this idea of working together is really important, right? That we're going to work together to take care of our firefighters who take care of us, and that we're all going to take care of the city. I also want to note that, you know, in the wake of prop Q and the vote against the tax rate increase, we also have to acknowledge the fiscal reality. We're locked into these very important public safety contracts that are generous and really show a strong commitment to our sworn public safety staff, and we're in these agreements. At the same time, we're tightening our belts due to state revenue caps and federal cuts. And so I absolutely support this deal. I'm excited to vote for it. I also support our city workforce as a whole, and that means our public safety workers and our civilian workers. And I don't want our civilian workers to see these contracts and feel any sort of new vulnerability. There is a narrative out there, post prop Q, that austerity is here, and all we're going to do as a city is fund public safety and infrastructure. And I think I speak for this council. [10:00:29 AM] That's not our intention. We want to take care of all of the workers who make our city special. And so we're going to have to be creative and aggressive to raise revenue, to keep pace with our labor costs. And at this point, I really do want to celebrate our economic development team, including doctor Eric Johnson, assistant city manager, and everyone who made the southwest airlines deal possible. Right. Those of you who haven't heard, we're bringing 2000 good jobs, mainly union jobs, many millions of dollars in new tax revenue. And this is the kind of creativity we're going to need in a world where Austin as a city, has to be as self-sustaining as possible. So I'm committed to that. I think we all here are committed to that, to fight for the Austin. We want to see where workers are supported, where our programs are affected, and where residents are safe and prosperous. Thank you mayor. >> Thank you. Councilmember. Councilmember harper-madison. Councilmember qadri. >> Thank you, Mr. Mayor, I appreciate it. I'm happy to see this voter authorized collective bargaining process be conducted in good faith by all parties. In my opinion, and [10:01:32 AM] I Bob agrees. And that's all I got to say about that. And speaking about, I've seen and worked with a lot of union presidents over the nearly seven years on this dais, and it's not a competition, but I don't know that I've seen anybody match your energy and commitment. And, you know, I don't know that I've ever been more in admiration of a person who gave me a hard time before in my life. But I appreciate the hard time because you did it for your members. And it was it was an opportunity to recognize that union leadership, while engaging in politics shouldn't be political, it's about protection and advocacy for your members. And I echo my colleagues appreciation for your service and welcome you, president elect Gerard. I believe that this agreement provides pay adjustments which are really important, and lump sum pay adjustments while [10:02:34 AM] preserving operational stability and that continuity of services citywide is critical. I echo councilmember Ellis's questions about blackouts and brownouts and which stations and where and will in the future have further questions about construction of fire stations. I got some questions about that. So when we're talking about budgetary deficits, I, I've had the opportunity to make observations about how we renovate and rebuild fire stations. I got a lot of questions about cost there. I other cities, you know, in terms of our peer cities, they're able to build fire stations efficiently and affordably. And Austin somehow still is not making the cut there. And I think some of that deficit can be made up when we take into consideration what our costs are there and make sure that we're on pace with other cities. And if and when we're not, let's figure out why. This agreement maintains our four person staffing requirement, which was always [10:03:36 AM] at the at the top of my list for something that we had to figure out how to preserve given, you know, these tough times that those purse strings are tightening and not, you know, just in one place. It's everywhere. And that won't change. You know? Director Lang made mention of, you know, what our budgetary deficit was anticipated to be, what it looks like moving forward. And I think we're all going to recognize that everything will be affected by budgetary deficits, especially when, you know, to director Lange's point, our expenditures are outpacing our revenues. And that's those are that's data. Those are facts you can't fight. I really appreciate that. This vote that we're about to take is about Austin respecting labor and honoring negotiation agreements and still governing as responsibly as we can. Approving this contract also provides certainty for the department and allows the council to focus ahead of our on, or rather, on, longer term [10:04:37 AM] workforce and public safety strategy. So happy to see this thing get put to bed and happy holidays Austin, Texas. >> Thank you, councilmember, councilmember qadri and councilmember Ellis. >> Thank you mayor. You know what an exciting day at Austin city hall. What an exciting day for austinites. You know, this contract is not only a win for the firefighters, but it's a win for all of us. You know, we as a council often talk about making sure that the city works for everyone. This is that this is that inaction. So just want to, you know, hats off to the firefighters. Hats off to the negotiating team from the city. Enjoy the many conversations with my fellow three, six one Roxy. And also thank you to afe the fire association. I'm going to miss Bob met Bob as a as a candidate have been able to work with him for the past three years. I know the amount of labor of love that you know, he he puts into this work so much that when he was I don't know if it was Disney world or [10:05:39 AM] disneyland during these negotiations, he was sending us emails and texts. I think we all got emails and texts from Bob. But you're going to be missed, Bob. But hopefully next time you go to Disney, you won't have to worry about anything. And really looking forward to working with David moving forward. >> Thanks, councilmember. Councilmember Ellis. >> Thank you. I'm glad that this agreement protects four person staffing. I remember getting to meet with Bob way back on a rainy day in 2018 at radio coffee, and he explained to me the importance of four person staffing. And he said, will you commit to supporting it? So it's it's great to be here this many years later, still upholding that commitment and still doing what we can to make sure that our firefighters are safe and that our community is safe. I think this package is competitive. I think it helps our department recruit and retain good employees, and I think that's an important part of what these bargaining agreements do for us. Getting creative with scheduling and making sure that firefighters not only have the ability to protect and serve our community, but also have some time off to [10:06:39 AM] be with their family or to attend events that are important to them is something that we want to encourage. We want to make sure that firefighters are as much a part of our community as as we see them. We want to make sure they can afford to live in Austin and and be in the communities that they serve. And so I really want to appreciate the union. Bob, knowing you all these years has been fantastic. I look forward to working with Mr. Gerard in the future, and definitely thank you to Roxy and Lowell, who have put a lot of hours into this and trying to make sure that you bring us a package that the council can support. And I always say it's an interesting day at city hall when we get very few speakers, because you know that a lot of good work has gone into this. If you don't have a lot of people coming and saying something is great or something is not great yet. So really, to get to a point where everybody's in agreement and willing to move forward together is, is what government is all about and what public service is all about. >> Thank you, councilmember members. There being no further discussion on item number one. [10:07:40 AM] Without objection, item number one is adopted. Congratulations, everybody. That will take us to item number two members as it was described earlier. That is an ordinance to amend the general fund operating budget to comply with the agreement that we have just adopted. I'll entertain a motion. Motion is made by the mayor pro tem, seconded by council member qadri to approve item number two. Is there any discussion with regard to item number two? We do have somebody signed up to speak. >> There are no speakers. >> Oh well okay. This little sheet you gave me says there are, but that's alright. Very good. If there are no speakers then the motion has been made and seconded. Is there any discussion? There being none. Without objection. Item number two is adopted on all three readings. That will take us now to item number three, which is to increase the authorized strength in order to comply [10:08:42 AM] with the the agreement that we have adopted in item number one, council member qadri moves approval of item number three. It is seconded by council member Siegel. Are there any speakers? >> This speaker withdrew her name as well. >> Very good. All right. Is there any discussion on item number three? There being no discussion without objection. Item number three is approved on all three readings as well. Members. That concludes the agenda. Let me say, to end this special called meeting, an echo of everybody's thanks to all of the people that have participated in this and gotten us to this point. We really deeply appreciate all, appreciate all of the work. And with that, I'll say on behalf of the Austin city council, happy holidays. Merry Christmas to everybody. Have a great safe holiday period. And without objection, the Austin city council at this special called meeting is adjourned at 10:09 AM