Upland POA went into negotiations facing an uphill battle.  The City was using the League of Cities playbook and maintaining its position that "given the economy" it would not be prudent to provide increases "at this time."  A review of the City's finances showed that although they did not want to give their police officers an increase "given the economy," the City had no problem spending money on building new City buildings, including over ten million on a new animal shelter that the City's own study said was not needed. 

Led by the outgoing POA President, Marcello Blanco and the incoming President, Jim Potts, the POA decided it was time to take the fight to the public. Given the economy, we of course did not complain to the public about compensation but instead pointed out all the realities that were occurring as a result of the low compensation package.  We put an information campaign together to let the public know that many officers had left Upland to go work at other higher paying agencies and as a result, public safety programs were being cut.  Gang enforcement, bike patrol, DARE and several other areas the public cares about were all cut as a result of the staffing shortage. 

The Upland City Manager was interested in properly compensating the City's police officers but did want to put it off as long as possible when the economy would be in better shape.  With the public campaign, the politically astute City Manager decided that it should be done sooner than later and came to the table to make a deal happen.  The end result was a three year contract.  In year one of the contract, several important no cost items were put into the MOU, including binding arbitration for discipline cases (a great thing if you can get it), purging of personnel files of disciplinary records older than five years, a "960 plan" that allows retirees to come back and work up to 960 hours in a fiscal year and increasing the compensatory time off bank from 80 to 240 hours.  In the second year of the contract, a raise of 5.4% is provided and a $30 increase in the monthly allotment for medical insurance is added.  In the middle of the third year another 5.4% raise comes with another $30 increase in medical.  Finally, at the end of the third year, another $30 increase in medical is provided and a salary survey of the higher paid surrounding agencies will be performed, taking Upland to the average (estimated to be another 3% to 5%).  In these "economic times" a pretty solid deal was achieved by Upland POA.