Citizen Comment:
Three people show up, plus one more at the 3 pm workshop. The basic themes are:
- Yes on pay raises for police and fire fighters
- What’s with the shootings and mayhem downtown?
- If we’re so broke, why are we spending money on Kissing Alley and other frivolous things?
- Remember, Mark Gleason got reprimanded by the Ethics Review Commission in 2023. This was because he received campaign contributions above the limit from SM fire fighters, but then didn’t recuse himself from the vote on their contract. Any council members need to recuse themselves?
That last point is exactly the problem with the PAC!
There’s also a short note from the city manager about the shootings downtown. Condolences to those grieving, thank yous to first responders, that sort of thing.
….
Items 4-5: Contract Extensions and Raises for SMPD and Fire fighters
Let’s start with some backstory!
Backstory
Unions are massively constrained in Texas. This is because:
- Texas is a right-to-work state. You can’t make joining a union automatic. But unions are still required to represent all employees.
- Texas allows at-will employment, so it’s easy to find a pretext to fire people
Public sector unions are especially helpless in Texas. In addition to the constraints above, there are explicit laws:
- No collective bargaining. Literally, you can’t have your union negotiate contracts on behalf of the employees.
- No going on strike
That all is a massive bummer. It means that public employees can’t speak in a coordinated, unified voice. (For a state that claims to worship freedom, it seems a bit off to outlaw employees from coordinating their actions, yes?)
Anyway, there are two exceptions: Fire fighters and police departments are allowed full strength unions! They get a special carve out! How nice for them, and no one else.
You’ll need some vocabulary:
SMPOA: San Marcos Police Officers Association, which is their union.
SMPFFA: San Marcos Professional Fire Fighters Association, the fire fighter union.
“Meet and Confer” – the collective bargaining process. This is the negotiation process to come up with new SMPD and SMFD contracts.
More backstory
In 2021, SMPD officer Ryan Hartman blew through a stop sign and killed a woman, Jennifer Miller, in Lockhart. He was treated with kid gloves. He had an open container in his car, but wasn’t given a breathalyzer test. Etc. This all happened right when Chief Standridge was first arriving at SMPD. Hartman wasn’t indicted, and got right back on the force. (Hartman was later fired for excessive force in a separate incident.)
[Updated to add correction: Hartman was later fired because he “failed to turn in incident reports under the required time limit for SMPD Officers“. That followed an incident where Hartman tased a compliant man, was lightly disciplined, and the city ended up settling with the victim for $125K. -TSM]
Mano Amiga was FURIOUS at how poorly the Hartman investigation was run. In response, they came up with five Hartman Reforms that they wanted the city to adopt:
In 2022, the SMPD contract was up, and it was time for Meet and Confer. The city ignored the Hartman Reforms and just passed a standard contract.
So Mano Amiga fired up a petition to get the Meet and Confer agreement repealed. They were successful! Council agreed to renegotiate the contract. (It was either that, or they’d have to put Repeal Meet and Confer on a ballot for voters.)
Spring 2023: Negotiations re-open. Some mild concessions are made towards the Hartman Reforms, and the contract is passed.
That’s a breezy summary, but trust me – this was a huge production. Probably hundreds of hours of citizen engagement, all told.
The 2023 contracts expire next October 2026. That means we should start Meet and Confer this spring.
Which brings us to today!
Should we sign a one year extension until October 2027? It includes a 4.5% raise for fire fighters, and a 5% raise for SMPD, effective in October 2026.
City staff needs this extension, because they need to deal with the whole EMS mess, and also to deal with the fallout of how we sabotaged our own budget.
Amanda proposes this amendment:
Discussion ensues! Let’s break down the basics.
Key points:
- Meet and Confer meetings should be open to the public, recorded, and broadcast
- There should be a citizen comment portion
- Documents should be made publicly available.
Question: How is this different from the current situation?
Answer: Really, only the citizen comment would be new. We started recording and broadcasting meetings in 2023, and documents are always available under the Texas Open Records policy.
Why do this?
There are lots of good reasons!
First off, legally there is a clause in Meet & Confer laws that requires transparency and openness to the public. So this is consistent with how these things are supposed to go.
Second, this is public money! Here’s the General Fund breakdown for 2026:
Those big blue and orange slices above are SMPD and SMFD. They make up about 36.7% of the General Fund, and combined, they are about $45 million. Citizens should get to speak up, just as they do for the rest of the budget.
Third, this one-year extension is occurring with virtually no community discussion. It’s a good faith gesture by council to acknowledge the outcry in 2023, and make a move towards transparency.
Finally, Austin has a similar resolution that applies to PD, Fire, and also their labor unions. It seems to work fine.
How would this work?
This is where conversation stalls out for about an hour. I’m going to give your the super abbreviated version.
- What would the details of the citizen comment actually be?
Should each person who wants to speak get 1 minute? Should it be capped at 30 minutes? Should it be at the beginning and at the end of each meeting? Should it be on another night altogether, and recorded as a forum? Should there be an email address?
Amanda’s pitch: Let’s leave these details to the negotiating team. Council does not need to micromanage.
Jane is extremely uncomfortable leaving it vague. She wants to know how it will play out. She’s worried if the ground rules aren’t quite right, it will sabotage the collaborative spirit of the negotiations.
2. How exactly does the timeline work?
Does SMPOA and SMPFFA have to agree now, before the extension is approved? Or can this just be where our negotiators start, when Meet & Confer starts, in the spring of 2027?
They settle on the latter. This is the starting point for the future discussion, where they lay the ground rules for the 2027 Meet & Confer contract. It got discussed a LOT, though.
Here are the basic Council member reactions:
Jane: I’m all for transparency but I’m allergic to leaving unspecified details like this.
Saul: I’m all for it. Sounds great.
Shane: This is government overreach. I’m tired.
Alyssa: This shows the community that we are responding to the activism of 2023. This is a good-faith gesture that makes progress towards transparency and community trust.
Lorenzo: I have a lot of detailed technical questions about the legality and timeline, but I’m not exactly opposed to the premise.
Matthew: <crickets>
…
Time to vote!
Here’s the official language they settle on:
And here’s the vote on the amendment:
Should City Representatives start negotiations with a request for transparency and citizen comment?
It sails through.
Hey look – there’s that Matthew guy! The one who was literally just re-elected the day before, with 57% of the vote. He absolutely does NOT want your input on SMPD and SMFD.
(SMPFFA and SMPOA were two separate votes, but everyone voted the same way on both.)
…
And then, the actual vote:
Yes on a one year contract extension and pay increases?
Great.
(Again, there were separate votes for SMPOA and SMPFFA, but they went the same way.)
…
That’s basically the whole meeting! There are some appointments to committees and things, but nothing big.
The San Marxist 