The Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) - A day after thousands of police officers and firefighters rallied for higher pay, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he expected police officers to get a 14 percent raise over two years - much less than the 23 percent the union has demanded.
“They’re going to get 14 percent,” Bloomberg said Friday on his weekly radio show on WABC.
Bloomberg administration officials said the mayor’s comments were based on a draft of a report issued by the state arbitration panel. The panel’s final decision, which is pending, will be binding.
Bloomberg said the draft report gives officers a raise of 5 percent in the first year and 4 percent in the second year, with an additional 5 percent pay increase financed by shortening officers’ work days and requiring them to work 10 extra days per year.
Many members of the union, the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, were angered by reports that the preliminary draft might be approved and rallied Thursday in Times Square.
The officers invoked their response to the Sept. 11 attacks, some chanting “too much praise, too little raise.”
Bloomberg said Friday that he was sympathetic to the officers, but said “once you go to binding arbitration, you don’t have a choice.”
“There’s nothing the city can do about this,” he said.
Beginning New York police officers earn $31,305 a year. PBA members have been working without a contract since July 31, 2000.