Newark submits plan to eliminate nearly 1,000 city jobs

NEWARK — Newark submitted a layoff plan to the state Civil Service Commission this week, taking a crucial step toward the biggest purge of workers the city has seen in decades.

In the next two years, nearly 1,000 city jobs — a quarter of the current workforce — will be eliminated through layoffs and attrition, according to city budget officials and documents. Personnel costs comprise roughly 70 percent of the city’s annual spending. Since winning re-election in May, Mayor Cory Booker has sounded the alarm on reducing those costs, saying they are the single biggest contributor to the city’s persistent deficit.

"What we have to do right now is achieve approximately $200 million in personnel savings — period," Booker said in a budget presentation earlier this summer, but added that because of severance packages, pensions, and unemployment insurance, "We won’t get the full credit of that until 2012, 2013."

But Booker has already begun to take the blame.

The sanitation department — slated to lose 250 workers to privatization — has been protesting regularly in front of City Hall since early August.

Police unions, who stand to lose 167 officers have taken out billboards that read "Welcome to Newark — Stop Laying Off Cops and call Cory Booker."

Firefighter unions have warned of public safety debacles if they lose the 96 employees targeted by the mayor.

"This could set the city back 10 or 20 years. People are going to have second thoughts about sending people to school here and to Devils’ games," said John Sandela, president of the Newark Fire Officers Union. "The idea that Newark has become a destination city is going to come an end."

Saed Hindash/The Star-Ledger The Newark police officer's union has taken out billboards like this one at the intersection of Broad Street and South Street in Newark, to encourage residents to complain to Mayor Cory Booker about laying off hundreds of city employees.

Public safety has been the biggest priority for Booker since taking office and he routinely cites a drop in crime as his most important achievement. Law enforcement and union officials say if the layoffs go through, the city will lose precious ground in fighting crime.

"There’s no way in hell that any officer should be laid off here in the city of Newark especially with the incidents that are occurring more frequently," said Derrick Hatcher, president of the Fraternal Order of Police which represents about 1,300 officers. "There have been some major shooting and homicides in the last few weeks and I think that causes alarm to citizens."

Booker has repeatedly said the city can get through its budget crisis without layoffs if the unions agree to certain concessions such as uniform allowances and gas cards. Hatcher argues that their contract was negotiated at the end of 2008 and began in 2009. If Booker knew there was trouble then, he said, he shouldn’t have agreed to a deal.

"We negotiated fairly," said Hatcher. "Why should we give back?"

Sanitation workers won’t have the option of renegotiating as the department is being eyed for privatization. According to an internal budget analysis obtained by The Star-Ledger, the city could potentially save $7 million annually by outsourcing garbage collection to a private company.

Neither the state nor the city would comment on the layoff plan today. The Civil Service Commission has 30 days to approve the proposal.