Dear Friend --

I'm proud to announce we've just reached a tentative three-year agreement with the Police Officers Association (POA), which includes pension reform.

This new agreement provides modest pay increases for our hardworking police officers, will reduce costs to the taxpayer with police employees picking up the maximum share of pension costs, and modernizes our benefit package for public safety employees.

We're providing a new paid parental leave program, with up to 160 hours of paid leave for eligible employees for the birth or adoption of a child, or for placement of a foster child in their home. This new leave benefit, as well as an additional holiday and other changes to holiday pay accrual, will improve work-life balance for our public safety staff.

We're also creating new specialized skill pay for our Dive and SWAT personnel, to ensure we have the best available staff in these critical, highly skilled positions, and we've modified our training program to increase patrol capabilities.

This agreement, which comes to Council for approval next week, is fair and responsible. By offering a competitive wage and benefits package, it will allow us to continue to hire the best police recruits. And by achieving significant pension reform, it will enable the city to continue bringing down our long term liabilities.

I want to thank the POA leadership and our City negotiating team for their months of hard work, and I want to thank the POA membership who voted overwhelmingly in favor of this agreement last month.

This tentative agreement is a great step forward for public safety, our budget, and the entire city. I look forward to Council's discussion next Tuesday.

Go Long Beach!

Mayor Robert Garcia