Union wins fight with Kane County sheriff

A budget-saving move by Kane County Sheriff Pat Perez to slash seven minutes out of the workday has blown a new hole in the county budget after union members protested the impact to their pay and benefits.

Perez touted the elimination of paid roll call for corrections officers during his successful re-election campaign as one of several changes he’s implemented to reduce spending.

Calling it a raise, Perez told a county board committee Monday that a new arbitration ruling over the change requires Perez to give them back the pay for that seven minutes of daily roll call he eliminated.

The result is the county must now find $125,362 it didn’t budget to fund the cost of that daily roll call time. About $98,000 of that cost will come in the form of salary and wages for the officers. The rest of the cash is for the associated retirement and Social Security payments.

“I have an issue with this,” Perez said of the ruling. “I don’t think the arbitrator has the authority to tell me that I have to have overtime. ... This will be under discussion in the upcoming (collective bargaining agreement).”

This isn’t the first time a money-saving idea for Perez’s budget has soured. Twenty-six sheriff’s department employees threatened to sue the county at the end of 2009 when the county board voted to furlough them. The threat of the lawsuit turned the four furlough days into a paid vacation.

Perez must come back and work with the county board’s finance committee to find the $125,362.