union negotiations in another small town

Steve H writes:

Our issue is that the union contract is negotiated separately from the annual budget crisis. When the budget battle begins, this leaves only other smaller areas for cuts. The town council gives the school committee and the school a dollar figure for the cuts, and they come up with cuts that push the most hot buttons for parents. They fire up their automated phone system and email list to rile up the parents and get them to the meetings. We get automated phone messages not just from the school, but from the chair of the school committee about the budget. The town council threatens to take control over the selection of the line items. However, the town council pays little attention when the school committee negotiates the terms of the union contract. Many towns desperately need professional help when those contracts are negotiated.

We have nothing this complicated.

In the spring, one or two members of the Board of Education announce that Next year we won't have layoffs. Then the next year we have layoffs.

This spring the same guy who announced that we wouldn't have layoffs said we will break the tax cap in 2013. ("The folks in the press can quote me.")

So maybe that means we won't break the tax cap.

Thank God this guy isn't on the Federal Reserve.