Workforce report details City of Saint John's employee costs

The City of Saint John has publicly released a workforce report in the midst of contentious contract negotiations with its three main labour unions.

Contracts for outside workers, firefighters and police expired at the end of 2019. 

City negotiators have tied salary increases to a formula based on the municipality's average rate of property tax revenue growth over the past three years.

After years of nearly flat growth that amounts to 1.3 per cent.

At least one set of negotiations has broken down with the Saint John Police Commission negotiators and the police union, each filing complaints against the other to the province's Post Secondary Education, Training and Labour minister, Trevor Holder. 

The workforce report is being released against this backdrop.

It says the city has 917 full time equivalent positions, one for every 74 residents, and a total bill for payroll and benefits of $91 million.

It compares that to Fredericton with one employee for every 83 residents and one for every 110 residents in Moncton, although it notes the city's land area is larger than Fredericton and Moncton combined which "stresses" resources such as snow clearing, water and  transit service.

The document goes on the detail salary costs by employee group, along with annual increases over the past 15 years. It also looks at demographics, including gender breakdown, average age, number of sick days, and on the job injuries per group.

"The report is designed to be factual, to provide a single source of information on our workforce that will help guide current and future decisions by the leaders of this organization," said city manager John Collin.

But for reasons not explained Monday the document was withheld from the council agenda, which is normally released on the preceding Friday afternoon.

The agenda package instead listed the document as "to follow." 

In fact it appeared on the city website at some point Monday afternoon.

The result was that salary and benefit numbers, and other data listed in it could not be discussed or confirmed with employee groups prior to the meeting.

City clerk Jonathan Taylor said the report existed Friday but was excluded from the agenda on the direction of city manager John Collin. 

In a statement Tuesday, Collin said the release of city reports can be held until the council meeting if the issue is "large, or complex or very complicated or requires additional context."

He said the intent is not to withhold information from the public.

Questioned about the late release of the report, Mayor Don Darling said it "should have been provided in advance."

"When you're talking about openness and transparency the report should have been out there in advance for folks to digest," he said.

The issue is an important one because the report controversially assigns special added pension payments to each employee as if they are part of that employee's current benefits. 

Annual special payments of a $12-million lump sum were mandated by New Brunswick's then pension commissioner in 2012, after the city failed over several years to keep up with a ballooning deficit in its employee pension fund.

At its peak the plan was underfunded by $161 million putting the financial security of retirees at risk.

Along with the requirement for special annual pension payments the plan was converted by the province from defined benefit to shared risk, with the potential loss of some benefits for retirees.

The exact amount of the special extra city contribution varies according to the fund's investment returns.

For 2020 it is $9,575,000.

For the purposes of the new report, city managers allotted a portion of this year's special payment to each employee as a "cost."

In the case of a first class police constable, the document lists the special pension payment as $17,848 for this year. 
That brings the total cost for an average officer to $153,600 (including $30,762 in pension and benefits).

In fact, the city would still have to make the special pension deficit payments even if the employee's job no longer exists.

The Financial and Consumer Services Commission oversees pension plans in the province.

In a statement to CBC last fall, FCNB communications officer Alix Saulnier said special pension payments are often reflected by employers as a percentage of payroll but they "do not relate to any one employee or group of employees" because plan deficits are equally applicable to all pension plan members and retirees at the date the plan was converted to shared risk which, in the case of Saint John, was 2012.

The pensions of employees hired since 2012 are fully funded by their regular payroll contributions.

Darling said the special payments will likely have to continue until 2028, when it is expected the plan will be close to fully funded.