Agreed How bloated could the department be if they are talking about laying off 400. There are just over 4,000 firefighters
City Council votes for Mayor Turner's plan to layoff 220 firefighters to pay for raises https://m.chron.com/news/houston-te...s-layoffs-of-220-firefighters-to-13792153.php
He pretty clearly stated before hand that this would hamstring the city in the future and that he was against it, though I don't necessarily remember the future being basically as soon as it went into effect. He will get blamed regardless though.
Yes and a lot if HFD and HPD officers feel the same way i have spoken with a lot of them and they all say the same thing if everyone lived within the city they would be ok with the pay raises.
It's not over because it'll be appealed. I was trying to figure out the basis for saying it's unconstitutional, but haven't found it.
The fraud that goes on in allowing last year fire fighters and police to stack and get a ton of overtime thereby entitling them to a lifetime pension higher than any years salary starting in their 50's is a charade. I blame the mayors and councils of every city for being pushed around by the only Unions left in the country. They bankrupted industry and now they'll bankrupt local governments. The money has to come from somewhere and its not going to be pretty.
Overrules checks and balances. We don't like in a total democracy last i checked, the founding fathers made that very clear.
It was ruled constitutional by first judge, then appealed, and now ruled unconstitutional by second judge. It will be appealed and then go onto appellate court which will then go to Texas Supreme court. It was always going to go this way regardless of outcome. One party or the other was going to appeal.
Pensioners and boomers are about to blow a hole in federal, state, and municipal budgets. We simply can’t afford to be so generous.
I feel like Unions had a time and place but I feel like that went away long ago. Unions got incredibly fat and then they went away because the costs was outrageous. The cost of public sector workers is still outrageous but it won't go away because they don't operate in the same free market.
Or, looking at it from the opposite end, yanking the pensions out from under the pensioners who were promised that income is going to blow a hole in their personal budgets and leave us with a generation of poor elderly people.
Better that happens to our past than our future. If we are picking between drainage/infrastructure and pensioners, it’s a no brainer for me where the money should go. I’d prefer it not to happen but how many decades did we have in advance to prepare for this? Incompetence and mismanagement does have its consequences promises or not, and it’s both sides that have failed.
Assuming most firefighters and police officers are Conservative and anti Government so they should strap themselves up by their boot straps and stop depending on the darn government for handouts. They should start their own independent fire fighting companies and then they can charge whatever they want and make whatever they want! Hooray capitalism!
Pensions and retiree health care is what what was forcing auto companies into bankruptcy. They had no bank debt Our overall economy simply cannot afford the things we could afford in the fifties and sixties. America's economy isnt the dominant force it was post WWII and as far as retirement is concerned one of the fundamental issues is people live a lot longer
Im stating facts about the auto companies. Reriree obligations were forcing them into bankruptcy with no bank debt. Spin it however but pensions in the private sector are things of the past
