With the meet-and-confer process between city of Columbia workers and administration under way, workers presented their wish lists for the upcoming budget year to the Columbia City Council on Monday night.

The process began May 1 with a meeting between City Manager Bill Watkins and the labor unions and will continue throughout the summer until they reach an agreement.

Union representatives for the city’s fire, police, water and light, public works and parks and recreation departments shared many financial requests, such as 3 percent to 4 percent across-the-board cost-of-living raises, updating meal allowances set in the 1990s, and increasing shift differential pay.

But the unions’ top priorities don’t require money, just a change in the city’s process for promotions and performance review.

The Columbia Police Officers Association said its top goal is to change the process by which officers get promoted to include their numerical scores on the tests required for promotion: a written test and an oral board.

"If you pass your exams, then your name is on a list and the department head can choose anyone from those names. But they don’t have any numerical scores or rankings attached to them, so it’s completely subjective," said Donald Weaver, president of the association. "It should say something that our No. 1 priority is a cost-neutral request."

Weaver also requested the city implement a physical fitness program for police and increase tuition reimbursement for city employees from $600 a year to an amount equal to nine graduate credit hours at the University of Missouri - roughly $2,600.

Brad Frazier, speaking on behalf of Columbia firefighters, said firefighters would like to see the city release a ranking of test scores using random identification numbers so firefighters could know how they rank in the department. He said firefighters also would like to see a career ladder implemented to increase pay based on education levels.

Water and Light representative Kenny Hudson said his department’s employees would like to add more steps to the employee performance evaluations instead of using the three categories of "did not meet expectations," "met expectations" and "exceeded expectations."

Hudson said employees would like to have a range of 0 percent to 8 percent for merit raises to reward those who exceed expectations, rather than the city’s current rate of 1 percent for meeting expectations and 3 percent for exceeding expectations.

"As a supervisor, I fill these out, and I have many that meet but don’t exceed expectations," Hudson said. "They are good employees, but they can’t receive more than 1 percent. It really makes morale bad."

Regina Guevara, with Local 773 of the Laborers’ International Union of North America, represented several concerns for employees within the public works, parks and recreation and power plant departments.

Guevara requested the city enter a collective bargaining agreement with the union while also updating grievance procedures and giving written notice of the terms of agreement at the end of the meet-and-confer process.

Guevara said the city’s grievance process right now reduces issues to a lengthy "paper war," which discourages employees from using it. She said if parties could meet and discuss issues face to face as she does in other cities, they could resolve disagreements more effectively.

"Right now, there’s no opportunity to meet and talk things out," Guevara said.

Watkins said the city will continue to meet with the groups to discuss their requests. "We will attempt to work out as many noncost items as we can," Watkins said. The city did not meet with the groups on noncost items last year, Watkins said.

Watkins also reminded representatives of the projected tight budget for the upcoming year.

Next, city staff will determine cost estimates for all the requests. Watkins then will choose which requests to grant as he prepares his budget, which is reviewed by the city council after it’s released in July.

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