On Monday, Mayor Mike Duggan and Police Chief James Craig announced that tentative collective bargaining agreements were reached with three unions representing the city’s 2,224 sworn police officers, providing a 4% raise to all sworn officers.
The starting pay rate for officers will also get a boost from $31,700 to $36,000.
“We’re increasing the salary of starting officers so we can attract more quality recruits and increasing wages overall so that we can keep those quality officers,” said Commander Charles Mahone, DPCOA Vice President. “This is the first time in my career that the City has ever come forward to raise our pay before our contract was up. This is very positive.”
The proposed contracts will raise the officers’ pay $41 million over the next 4 years.
The money comes from a renegotiation of consultants fees as the bankruptcy proceedings come to a close. The $30 million dollar cut to the fees freed up the cash to help get more officers on the street.
“When our CFO, John Hill, announced that the savings in consultants’ fees could be available to fund other city services over the next 4 years, I urged the Mayor to invest those funds in the Detroit Police Department,” said Chief Craig. “We are trying to fill more than 200 vacant police officer positions, which is a problem that will become critical if we don’t address it.”
The City of Detroit is operating under a state-appointed Financial Review Commission (FRC), which must approve any collective bargaining agreements after determining that the city can fund the contracts without running a deficit.
“We often lose the officers we train to other police departments that can pay a higher wage,” said Mark Young, president of the DPLSA. “These changes are not only good for our officers and their families, they are good for the Detroit Police Department.”
