Police Protest Wage Contract

Members of the Cambridge Police Patrolmen's Association told the City Council last night that city negotiators bargained with them in bad faith by failing to inform them about a wage contract agreement which other city unions had signed.

Officer Robert Ames, the association's president, said all of the other city unions had accepted a contract granting a uniform pay raise for all city employees, with the proviso that if any union was given a higher raise, the others could reopen negotiations over wages.

This agreement discourages the city from giving the police officers the raise they have been requesting for six months, which is more than seven percent above the sum in the contract, said Officer Jay R. Gurry, vice president of the patrolmen's association.

"We have been bargaining faithfully, seeking only the pay raise that's the same as other police in other cities and towns," Ames said. He said he wanted to express his "serious concerns regarding [the police's] nonbargaining stance with the city."

"We used to be the best-paid police department in the state; now we've dropped to the middle," Ames said. He added that in Quincy the police force is receiving a 16 percent raise over the next three years, in Somerville 18 percent, and in Newton, 20 percent.

"When we mention these figures to the city they wave transfer forms in our faces. Maybe the whole department should move out," he said.

Although council members said they supported Ames' statements, they said that city law makes them unable to intervene directly in police union negotiations with the city.

However, the council passed an order requesting that City Manager Robert M. Healy be present at future negotiations between city personnel and police representatives.

Ames said the union has been trying to reach a contract agreement with the city for six months. He added that the police will continue to operate under their old contract until the city makes them an offer which they feel compares with the salaries of police in neighboring communities.

The city is now offering a pay raise of a total of 11 percent over the next three years, but Ames said this number is far below the raises being offered in other nearby towns.

Under the present contract, starting pay for Cambridge policemen is about $21,000 per year, and the wage ceiling is about $27,000 annually.

But Councilor Alice K. Wolf said this figure did not include police officers' benefits, which total an additional 28 percent of their wages, or payments they may receive from individual businesses or employers outside the city that pay an additional sum for police services.

Ames said that in Boston, where a police officer was killed on duty last spring, the police were given a nineteen-and-a-half percent raise over a three year period.

"Do we have to lose a police officer in this city before we can see an adequate pay raise?" Ames asked the audience and council.

Police spokesmen also said the city allots only eight percent of the city budget to the police department, a sum they said is inadequate to supply the necessary equipment, such as police radios, to all officers.