Headline Surfer photo / Edgewater Interim City Manager Tracy Barlow.
Making the Grade: Report Card: C
By HENRY FREDERICK / Headline Surfer
EDGEWATER, Fla. -- While the union for 80 city employees are in amicable talks over a new contract, one particular demand has no chance of passage: A request of 6 percent annual wage hikes.
This isn't Major League Baesball with its out-of-this-world arbitration figures. Yes, these workers are deserving of cost of living raises, but even 3 percent is asking a lot. With for sale signs dotting lawns through Southeast Volusia amid a national real estate crisis, taxpayers are already overwhelmed. 6 perce nt raises is pie in the sky.
This isn't Major League Baesball with its out-of-this-world arbitration figures. Yes, these workers are deserving of cost of living raises, but even 3 percent is asking a lot. With for sale signs dotting lawns through Southeast Volusia amid a national real estate crisis, taxpayers are already overwhelmed. 6 perce nt raises is pie in the sky (or face).
Interim City Manager Tracy Barlow, on the job since December, would be wise to keep those raises in check, if he expects to have the "interim" removed from his title.
Henry Frederick is publisher of Headline Surfer, the award-winning 24/7 internet news outlet launched 12 years ago that serves greater Daytona Beach, Sanford & Orlando, Florida via HeadlineSurfer.com. Frederick has amassed more than a hundred journalism industry awards in print & online -- more than than all other members of the working press combined in Central Florida since the mid-1990s. He earned his Master of Arts in New Media Journalism with academic honors from Full Sail University in 2019. Having witnessed the execution of serial killer Aileen Wuornos in Florida's death chamber and other high profile cases, Frederick has appeared on national crime documentary programs on Discovery ID and Reelz for his investigative reporting and cops & courts breaking news stories.