Mayor slashes ALL city employees down to minimum wage

[2011GT]

Yup. It'll ding your credit, and if it is big enough they might sue you. Even if they win they can't garnish your wages. The judgement will stick around for 10 years, but nothing else will happen.

Can they put a judgement or lien on your car or home? Just curious, I don't even live in Texas anymore.

[KungFuHamster]

what ill never understand is why they go after something like a police or firefighters pay, but not some bum on welfare's check/food stamps.

cut the social programs and watch the revenue go up!

[2011GT]

Why not? The trucks are already there, as is the equipment.

hum ok... With a city that large it's a full time job to be a fire fighter. Nobody is going to volunteer that amount of time. You need to think logically.

[Forever_frost]

hum ok... With a city that large it's a full time job to be a fire fighter.

And there are fire fighters who are willing to do the job for what the market will allow. You put the pay you can afford otu there and if people want the job, then they'll take it. If not, then you cut back the welfare programs and your illegals and try again.

Edited to address the rest of the statement:

Yes, there are people willing to donate that much time. Around here, the volunteers are always running around either training or fighting brush and field fires. And if you think 30 acres burning with access to several hundred more acres isn't a time consuming job, then you've never fought one

[2011GT]

what ill never understand is why they go after something like a police or firefighters pay, but not some bum on welfare's check/food stamps.

cut the social programs and watch the revenue go up!

Probably because the city doesn't control welfare pay. That's at state level. It makes sense though!!!

[talisman]

Can they put a judgement or lien on your car or home? Just curious, I don't even live in Texas anymore.

They can attempt to block the sale of your house, but if it is your homestead they can't do anything. If they actually interfere, you can turn around and sue their asses. I've heard if you have more than one car they can attempt to make you sell the secondary, but I've never heard of it actually happening.

[TENGRAM]

And there are fire fighters who are willing to do the job for what the market will allow. You put the pay you can afford otu there and if people want the job, then they'll take it. If not, then you cut back the welfare programs and your illegals and try again.

Edited to address the rest of the statement:

Yes, there are people willing to donate that much time. Around here, the volunteers are always running around either training or fighting brush and field fires. And if you think 30 acres burning with access to several hundred more acres isn't a time consuming job, then you've never fought one

Maybe they ought to pay illegals minimum wage to be firefighters and cops.

[2011GT]

I didn't see this coming...

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/07/10/scranton-civil-servants-file-class-action-lawsuit-against-city-mayor-for/?test=latestnews

Civil service workers in Scranton, Pa., still reeling from having their pay slashed en masse to the minimum wage, have filed a class action lawsuit against the beleaguered city and its mayor, who defied a judge’s order not to cut salaries.
The suit was filed by six Scranton police officers and firefighters in a Pennsylvania federal court Tuesday afternoon, but it covers them and "all other persons similarly situated,” saying that the collective action was against a violation from the Fair Labor Standards Act.
“The law is clear. You cannot violate a workers contract,” Thomas Jennings, an attorney who is representing three Scranton civil service unions, told FoxNews.com as he was preparing Monday to file multiple suits against the city and its Mayor Christopher Doherty.
Doherty cut everyone's pay -- including his own -- on Friday down to the state minimum of $7.25 per hour, saying the state's sixth-largest city is broke because the City Council blocked his proposed tax increase in a 2012 budget proposal.
The salary cuts are the latest in a long-standing stalemate between the mayor and the City Council, with the town’s employees stuck in the middle.
“This is a case where our local politicians can’t get it together,” Jennings said. “It’s not that they don’t have the money. It’s that he [Doherty] doesn’t want to get the money needed.”
Mayor Doherty has not responded to numerous requests from FoxNews.com for comment.
Also filed in federal court on Tuesday was a lawsuit on behalf of 10 retired Scranton cops and firefighters out on disability leave who had their benefits reduced.
A complaint petition was also filed in Lackawanna County Court arguing that Doherty had violated a judge’s order barring the Mayor from cutting wages.
The city of Scranton has battled budget woes for the past two decades, registering under the Distressed Municipalities Act, but the problems reached a boiling point after the City Council blocked Doherty's plan to raise taxes to cover a $16.8 million shortfall, opting instead to borrow money to cover the budget gap.
“Scranton is infamous as being economically depressed,” Anthony Figliola, vice president of Empire Government Strategies and former deputy supervisor for Brookhaven, N.Y., where he oversaw 500 employees and a $200 million budget, told FoxNews.com.
“The mayor is calling them [city council] on their bluff, but at the expense of the taxpayers. There’s a lot of things that could be done that they just aren’t doing," Figliola said.

[Forever_frost]

Borrowing instead of raising taxes. Yep, this is going to go well. HOw long until bankruptcy and flipping unions the bird?

[DON SVO]

I didn't see this coming...

“It’s not that they don’t have the money. It’s that he [Doherty] doesn’t want to get the money needed.”

I distinctly remember the first article stating that the mayor wanted a tax increase to ensure pay. Hmmm.

[Slowhand]

Christ. What a motherfucking clusterfuck of stupidity. It's coming from all sides (albeit far more from the council than from anywhere else), but it's pretty clear that the mayor is at his wit's end.

[stevo]

Can they put a judgement or lien on your car or home? Just curious, I don't even live in Texas anymore.

Don't forget, we are talking about a city here, I cannot see how a city would have a lien set against it.

Stevo

[DON SVO]

Don't forget, we are talking about a city here, I cannot see how a city would have a lien set against it.

Stevo

Put a lien on the Fine Arts District. That'll show em.

[46Tbird]

I have left three different companies when it looked like there was "some" financial trouble. As in, we start pushing the coffee vendor out to 120 days, shit like that. I cannot imagine waiting around to let the assholes cut my pay to minimum wage, especially if I'm only bringing down 450/wk to begin with. Must be a typical lazy, shitty government employee that's unemployable elsewhere.

[DON SVO]

I have left three different companies when it looked like there was "some" financial trouble. As in, we start pushing the coffee vendor out to 120 days, shit like that. I cannot imagine waiting around to let the assholes cut my pay to minimum wage, especially if I'm only bringing down 450/wk to begin with. Must be a typical lazy, shitty government employee that's unemployable elsewhere.

The apples never fall far from the tree. Get a job with the one you THINK is giving you the most free shit.