Moncton dishes out 6.5% wage hike over 4 years to city hall workers

Monctoncity councillorsapproveda new contract for about 230 city hall employees on Monday night, including civilian members of Codiac RCMP, that will cost approximately$300,000 in salary increases and benefits.

The contract for members ofthe City Hall Employees Association (CHEA) expired in December 2016.

The union and the city met numerous times over 2017, but came to an impasse over wages. A strike vote was scheduled in late November, butCHEAmembers chose to accept the city's offer.

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Isabelle LeBlanc, director of communications with the city of Moncton, said "an offer was presented, was rejected, we went into mediation and then finally that same offer was accepted by the union."

The new contract offers a 6.5 per centincrease over four years.

Gregg Houser, deputy treasurer with the city, said the numbers will be rolled into the 2018 budget that be presented to council in two weeks.

"We had estimates based on directions from council and we had estimates through the negotiations as to what we felt would be reasonable result, so we put those in a contingency account assuming we'd settle sooner than later, which fortunately we did."

CHEAmembers negotiated a slight wage increase over the last contract in 2013. It saw a six per cent rise over four years.