To:                   All Supervisor, Deputy, and Court Service Officer Bargaining Unit Members

From:               Mike Smith, Vice President Central Florida PBA

Date:                October 14, 2010

Subject:            PBA Response to Sheriff Demings’ Bonus Rejection

On October 12^th, 2010, Sheriff Demings notified all agency personnel that he was NOT going to provide the PBA Bargaining Units with a much needed and well-deserved $1100 bonus.  In large part, Sheriff Demings placed the blame directly on the PBA indicating that he was not able to give you a bonus via a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) because it would circumvent the bargaining process and/or not be within legal parameters.  Meanwhile, Sheriff Demings took no responsibility on himself for not giving you a bonus “without negative conditions”, despite numerous opportunities to do so in the past, present and future.  Although this letter was addressed to John Park, the Sheriff was speaking to all of YOU and trying to shift the blame for his inaction.

Let me refresh everyone’s memory with two specific facts stipulated to by the Sheriff’s Office in the PBA’s unfair labor practice lawsuit (evidence of the Sheriff’s ability to give you a bonus):

1)                   OCSO and PBA stipulated:  “The Sheriff’s Office can legally use funds budgeted for another purpose to provide a wage increase after the county advises the Sheriff it has not elected to fund the wage increase”.  (Para. 41 Hearing Officers’ recommended order)

 2)                 OCSO and PBA stipulated: “If it chose to do so, the County could also amend the Sheriffs budget at any time during the fiscal year to modify the budget by the amount of any increase implemented by the Sheriff”.  (Para. 41 Hearing Officers’ recommended order).

 3)                 Simply put, “NO LAW” prevents the Sheriff from “legally” using his money as he sees fit (including paying you).  Additionally, “NO LAW” stops the OCSO & PBA from going to the County and requesting, even now, that the Sheriff’s budget be “amended” to provide for the $1100 bonus payment.

Please do not let Sheriff Demings or anyone else pit us against each other so we can be easier to “divide and conquer.”  All this makes me wonder, how much does Sheriff Demings really care about you and your families.  Otherwise, he would not attach unacceptable conditions to your proposed bonus, including detrimental contract language that weakens your employee rights and threatens your job security.

The PBA is READY, WILLING, and ABLE to agree to jointly go to the County with Sheriff Demings to request the bonus money.  We have already communicated with County leaders regarding this matter.  Furthermore, the PBA is willing to withdraw its appeal of our unfair labor practice as long as the Sheriff withdraws his as well.  This offer has been repeatedly proposed to OCSO and rejected by them.

It is clear that the OCSO is the only one refusing to cooperate regarding the enhancement and protection of your pay, benefits and work conditions. 

The bottom line is that the bonus is still possible. However, it is going to take the OCSO and PBA working together (including our members and their family and friends contacting the County leaders for support) in order to secure these monies. 

THE PBA HAS BEEN AND CONTINUES TO BE WILLING TO WORK TOGETHER FOR THE PBA BARGAINING UNIT MEMBERS; HOW ABOUT YOU, SHERIFF DEMINGS?

Please stay informed by going to www.cfpba.org or www.facebook.com (search and request being a friend for John Park CFPBA) to review the most current updates.