Arizona’s Brewer Offers to Trade 5% Raises for Job Protections

Jan. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, seeking a freer hand over hiring and firing, proposed 5 percent raises to reward public employees willing to give up job protections afforded by the state’s personnel rules.The $108 million plan, unveiled yesterday in Brewer’s $8.5 billion budget recommendation, would be a step toward a mostly at-will workforce. Overhauling the state’s personnel system is one of her “most important” initiatives, Brewer has said.“It is an incentive, if they choose to do that,” Brewer told reporters in a briefing yesterday. She said it will show “that if they choose to move from underneath a covered position, that we are at liberty to do a lot of good things for them.”
Canada Goose Jakker Arizona finished its 2011 budget year in June with a balance of $3.2 million, compared with a $332 million deficit that had been forecast, according to a report by the Joint Legislative Budget Committee. To get there, state officials froze Medicaid enrollment and slashed social-services spending.The governor wants “personnel reform that improves the management of the workforce, restructures the grievance and appeal systems and modifies human resources practices,” Brewer said in her state-of-the-state address Jan. 9.While Arizona doesn’t bargain collectively with state employees, many non-management workers have certain job protections under personnel rules, including an appeals process that can overturn disciplinary actions. At-will employees can be dismissed at any time, with or without a reason being given.