Mayor Villaraigosa reawakens his talent for crafting compromise

MAYOR Antonio Villaraigosa swept into office in 2005 in part because of his reputation as a consummate dealmaker - the kind of politician who could break a stalemate and bring disparate sides together in compromise.

Yet, we've seen too little of that skill in recent years when L.A. truly needed a dealmaker. It seemed preposterous that this former labor negotiator couldn't strike a compromise with city employee unions to save Los Angeles from sinking further into deficit and inching closer to bankruptcy.

The powerbroker seemed to have lost his interest or his touch - until last week. Villaraigosa and his team of negotiators were able to craft a compromise with the city's largest civilian employee union that will save taxpayers $400 million over the next four years.

If approved by the 22,000 employees covered by the Coalition of L.A. City Unions, the deal would delay scheduled pay raises, cap city health care costs, impose unpaid holidays, freeze paid overtime and - most importantly - significantly increase the amount workers pay toward their retirement.

In exchange, the mayor and his negotiating team guaranteed the workers no furloughs through June 2014. That's a win for workers, who were stuck in a spiral of uncertainty, never knowing how many furloughs might be imposed or what their paychecks might look like the next month. It's also a win for taxpayers. Every furlough day causes an exponential decrease in city services.

This

is not a perfect deal. Coalition members still get generous raises foolishly promised by city leaders in 2008. Now the pay hike would be smaller this year and next year to help with the budget crisis, with the heftiest raise pushed back to January 2014.

Still, this deal needs a little perspective. This "watershed moment," as the mayor called the agreement last week, means that workers will - for the first time - pay a portion of their salary toward retirement health care coverage. Up until now, city employees and their spouses received lifetime health care coverage as part of their pension contribution - which has been about 6 percent salary for civilian workers. As of July 1, they'll pay 11 percent of salary.

That kind of benefit is virtually impossible to find in the private sector these days.

Still, given iron-clad union contracts and the need to negotiate every concession, this is a good deal. Villaraigosa and the Coalition deserve credit for reaching an agreement that protects services and saves money. But they can't leave it at one compromise.

Villaraigosa should use his deal-making prowess on the other city employee unions. The Coalition agreement set a reasonable precedent. If public employees are going to keep their generous pay and perks, then they need to pay a much greater share of the expense. That goes for all employees - whether civilian, firefighter and police officer.

Is the deal-making mayor back for good? For the sake of the city's future, we hope so.

A Los Angeles Daily News editorial. To read more editorials from the Daily News, go to www.dailynews.com/opinions.

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