The NYPD's rank-and-file union has struck a long-awaited contract deal with the city, officials announced Tuesday.
NBC 4 New York first reported the new tentative contract was in place, covering over 23,800 NYPD employees. The Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, which has been working without a contract since 2010, has gone into binding arbitration over failure to resolve previous contracts.
The new deal includes retroactive pay raises and requires that all NYPD officers be outfitted with body cameras by the end of 2019.
The executive board for the PBA approved the pact, which will then go for full vote among its rank and file.
As part of the deal, the PBA agreed to drop it lawsuit against the city involving body cameras.
A spate of deaths at the hands of police across the country has led to demands that officers be issued wearable cameras, but costs and union resistance has slowed that effort.
The agreement Tuesday marks the second voluntary settlement reached between the city and the PBA since 1994. The failure to resolve a contract for police has been underlying much of the tension between Mayor de Blasio and his police officers.
Major points of the deal include:
- Wage increases constituting 11 percent over seven years when combined with the previous 2-year arbitration award reached in 2015 (wages were increased 1 percent each in 2012 and 2013, then 1.5 percent in 2014, another 2.5 percent in 2015, and then 3 percent more in 2016)
- A "neighborhood policing differential" for all officers effective March 15, 2017, which amounts to 2.25 percent of an officer's base salary. Starting salaries will be reduced for newly hired employees as a result, and they'll now start at $42,500, and progress as follows:
After 1.5 years - $45,000
After 2.5 years - $46,000
After 3.5 years - $47,000
After 4.5 years - $51,000
After 5.5 years - $85,292
- The PBA has agreed not to sue over body cameras, resulting in the NYPD outfitting every patrol officer with body cameras by the end of 2019
- The PBA won't sue over administering naloxone, the lifesaving drug used by first responders as an emergency overdose treatment
- Both the city and the PBA agree to support state legislation that would provide three-quarter of salary in the even of disability. The pension benefit, which is expected to be consistent with other uniformed unions, will include a 1 percent employee contribution
- The PBA will withdraw litigation related to the 2014 and 2016 letter agreements on health savings and welfare fund contributions between the city and the Municipal Labor Committee
