By Tom Waring
Times Staff Writer
Cathy Scott believes city workers suffer from a public image problem.
Scott, president of District Council 47’s Local 2187 since 1993, wants Philadelphians to know that her 2,900-plus members do the job.
“Our members work hard, are very knowledgeable and do very important work,” she said during an interview last week at her office at 1606 Walnut St. “They want to do a good job.’
Scott, who lives with her husband, John, on Chandler Street in Fox Chase, is one of the key players as the city negotiates new contracts with D.C. 47, District Council 33 and Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 5.
Thomas Paine Cronin is the longtime president of D.C. 47. The union consists of nine locals, only two of which have contracts with the city.
Local 2187 represents a wide range of city workers — librarians, social workers, recreation leaders, forensic scientists, aquatic biologists and many more professions. Local 2186, headed by Mike Walsh, represents supervisors.
Their four-year contract expires June 30, and negotiations aren’t going well. A strike authorization vote is set for Tuesday.
“There’s a strong feeling in our local to strike,” Scott said.
The union leader, who was elected to a fourth term last October, blames city officials for squandering a budget surplus and setting what she believes are skewed priorities.
She points to City Council’s whopping 15-percent pay raise, no-bid city contracts, $6 million contribution to the Phillies and Eagles for the upkeep of their new stadiums and the taxpayer-funded attorneys’ fees for city employees being interviewed as part of the grand jury probe of alleged City Hall corruption.
And she blasts a proposed Keystone Opportunity Improvement Zone (KOIZ) that would allow Comcast to build a 60-story tower in Center City and pay no taxes for 15 years. The state program is intended to bring development to areas that are struggling to attract business.
“For anyone to think Comcast is a depressed business or 17th and JFK is a depressed area, I don’t know what planet they’re on,” she said.
Scott, who turned 59 on June 14, understands that there’s only a limited amount of money in the city coffers. Still, she thinks the city’s proposal to eliminate staffing levels in various departments is shortsighted.
Instead, she wants the city to be a partner with the union in the Redesigning Government Initiative (RGI). She contends that the initiative has streamlined operations in the revenue and recreation departments and the police crime lab.
In April, D.C. 47 asked the city for a three-year contract that would give members a 5-percent pay raise and a cost-of-living adjustment every year. Scott acknowledges that was an initial offer, adding that the city undoubtedly will reject it.
The Street administration hasn’t offered any specifics on raises yet, since it’s battling City Council over how deep to cut taxes.
The administration has long indicated that it would like to abolish the medical plans run individually by D.C. 47, D.C. 33, the FOP and Local 22, the firefighters union. In their place, the city would create one plan.
Scott is adamantly opposed to the proposal. She notes that D.C. 47 receives $620 per member per month from the city for its plan, while the city plan costs $735 per employee and doesn’t include dental coverage or hearing aids.
“Why would our members want to go into a plan administered by the city that costs them more and gives them less?” she asked.
The union also opposes a city proposal to end members’ defined retirement benefits, which are based on salary and years of service. The city would like to move to a program that limits its contributions and allows workers to invest the money in the stock market.
“If the stock market doesn’t do well, you don’t have much of a pension,” Scott said.
The threat of a strike is nothing new for Scott, a 1963 Little Flower High School graduate who has a sociology degree from Penn State.
She became a city social worker in 1971 after four years as a case worker for the state Department of Public Welfare. She first went on strike in 1978.
In 1983, she became a full-time union official. She helped lead strikes in 1986 and ’92.
Now, as another strike looms, Scott said the union wants what’s fair and has no intention of further harming the city’s budget woes.
At the same time, D.C. 47 doesn’t want to be a scapegoat in the city’s financial crisis.
“We didn’t take the city from a surplus to a deficit,” Scott said. “We don’t want the city to balance the budget on our members’ backs.” ••
Reporter Tom Waring can be reached at 215-354-3034 or twaring@phillynews.com