After months of back-and-forth, Austin has OK'd a four-year labor contract with the Austin Firefighters Association.
The hope is that the $63 million deal will boost recruitment at the Austin Fire Department by increasing wages and adjusting staff schedules. Those schedule adjustments are intended to prevent gaps in service amid a hiring slump and burnout among firefighters. The firefighters union said yes to the tentative deal Wednesday night with 72% of members approving the contract. The Austin City Council passed it unanimously Thursday, capping off a contentious contract negotiation.
Outgoing AFA President Bob Nicks said the deal maintains a four-person requirement for shifts, a key sticking point in the negotiations for the union.
"I think this agreement is a good deal for labor and management," he said. "It wasn't easy getting here."
The city and the AFA previously agreed on a deal back in October ahead of the citywide vote on Proposition Q. The budget proposal in Prop Q would have covered some gaps in AFD's overtime budget. But the ballot measure's failure pushed the city to propose reducing staff on AFD shifts to save money, prompting the union to walk away from the bargaining table last month.
After the fallout, the union put together a petition to amend city law to require that four-person standard, but has agreed to drop that effort as a condition of the contract.
Austin City Manager T.C. Broadnax said the deal resolved months of heated negotiation — and addressed concerns for both sides.
"I believe we have arrived at a true and complete agreement for the next four years," he said.
The new agreement maintains the four-person standard for AFD fire trucks and increases pay for firefighters across the board. Pay for cadets will increase by more than 6% in the first year of the deal, and early-career firefighters will see pay raises of at least 5%.
All firefighters will also get a $1,100 bonus at the start of the new year under the contract.
Assistant Chief Tom Vocke said those incentives and a new schedule that offers more flexibility will help the department attract more qualified candidates from across the state.
"The pay raises are substantial," Vocke said. "And the new schedule gives us something to offer that other departments don't offer. There's not any big cities in Texas that have a schedule like this right now, so I think that's probably the biggest win for us from a recruiting standpoint."
The new schedule is similar to one used in Portland, Oregon. Portland adopted the schedule in 2022 to reduce burnout and allow firefighters more time off-shift to maintain better work-life balance. An ongoing study updated this past summer found that fire personnel in Portland and across Oregon felt more alert and were able to "detach more" from work under that schedule.
