Discussion 1. The city's goal was to reduce the budget where the union acknowledged that cost cutting needed to happen. The community would not benefit from the city proposal because they would lose most of their cross trained firefighters who were also paramedics. The proposal that the union helped to come up with actually saved 74 firefighter jobs but still achieved the cost savings the city needed. The new plan worked out better for both sides as there would be a stronger growing and more cross trained firefighters available to help the community vs losing all their younger cross trained firefighters and then losing additional through retirements, or attrition. The cost of training new firefighters to replace the ones going out would be costly to the city. Having a union to help negotiate a contract for the firefighters was important for both the city and the firefighters.
Discussion 2. The overlapping interest the city manager and the Local 42 of the International Association of Fire Fighters had was to cut $7.6 million of the fire fighter's department budget. Both parties understood that the budget cut was needed. The city manager wanted to cut 107 jobs, while Local 42 wanted to negotiate other ways to meet the budget cut. They recommended cutting 33 positions through "attrition and early retirement incentives". (Noe, et. al, 2014). If all 107 jobs were to be cut, society would be drastically impacted. There would not be enough fire fighters available to help with emergency situations that could mean life or death. Many of the individuals were cross-trained as paramedics and fire suppression professionals and if all of those positions were cut, the city manager would have to find it within their budget to cross train others who had not had the training.
The importance of understanding the interests of labor unions includes the labor relations strategy; negotiating contracts; and administering contracts. How will the organization work with the union to maintain operations? Through negotiation. The union will help distinguish proper pay; job security; and safety regulations. The city manager and Local 42 were able to work together to find the resolutions to meet the criteria of both sides. In the end, through negotiation, the budget was able to be lowered while keeping a majority of fire fighters jobs in tact.