Labor negotiations between Jacksonville and the Fraternal Order of the Police are heating up, with Mayor Donna Deegan saying she didn't expect to hear the union head's take during a recent interview.
"I have never heard from Randy (Reaves) myself. So I was a little surprised to see that in the media," Deegan said on WJXT's "This Week in Jacksonville."
Reaves told host Kent Justice that locals may not know what's at stake in the wage talks for the underpaid and staff-deficient police officers, correctional workers, and Judicial officers whose futures are being negotiated currently.
"Any competent person is going to look at this data and it is going to sound alarms," Reaves said.
"I think if the public knew that their first responders and their law enforcement was a short, 180 short in the jail, over 40 short on the police side, and underpaid by 19%, I think that would shock a lot of people and it also would probably bring a lot of attention to how the city invests money in other things while their first responders are being underpaid."
Deegan was not willing to offer insight about the city's position ahead of the April 12 meeting between city negotiators and those from the union.
"I can't talk about the numbers and what we're thinking and what will actually come from that. That would be a violation of the negotiating team," Deegan said, adding that both parties "will come to an agreement and I'm sure that that will happen before too long."
Though the Mayor says the "negotiating team" would be compromised by disclosure of position, the police union is very clear in what it wants from the city.
Without raises, members of the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office (JSO) would be 34% behind the state average pay by 2027. To that end, JSO seeks a 17% raise for Fiscal Year 2024-25, with 4% hikes in each of the next two years.
FOP seeks a 20% increase in the first year of the contract and a 10% hike in each of the next two years for correctional officers, noting the most recent training class could only get 11 candidates despite having 40 spots to fill.
Regarding judicial officers, the union seeks a 17% raise in the first year of the deal, with 5% hikes the next two years.
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