San Francisco firefighter union officials reached a tentative firefighters' agreement with the executive board and mayor's office to forgo pay raises to save the city $18 million over the next two years, officials said in a press release.

A memorandum of understanding negotiated in 2007 promised firefighters and police a 23% pay raise spread over four years. As part of the tentative agreement, firefighters will relinquish about 8% in such future wages, said Joanne Hayes-White, fire chief for the last six years. Hayes-White said she's been under pressure to cut costs, and such concessions by firefighters will help her shave $13 million from the department's $275 million operating budget.

"This year has been challenging," she said. "It was particularly daunting because all of the low-hanging fruit and easier solutions to cut costs have already been implemented in previous budgets."

Over the past few years, the department has managed to cut costs without having to lay off firefighters, EMTs/paramedics or temporarily deactivate units, Hayes-White said. She did so by reviewing their entire operations, including staffing and how fire and EMS services were structured. Some civilian administration personnel lost their jobs, and once a person retired their position was eliminated. In addition, one battalion chief lost his job when the city's 10 battalions were reduced to nine.

The department also reconfigured how they staffed EMS services. Personnel no longer work 24 hour shifts. Instead, peak-period staffing is deployed, which is determined by statistics based on peak hours of population growth. In San Francisco, this meant staffing up when its resident 800,000 population doubled during the workweek from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.

"So instead of having a fixed number of ambulances working at any given time, we staff up during the peak periods, and then we will drop off during the slower times," Hayes-White said. "So those types of creative solutions have assisted us to become more efficient and save money as well."

Hayes-White said the primary assistance to cuts costs comes from the fire department's members in the form of the tentative agreement to go without promised raises. She said the agreement states that the union will revisit the MOU with the city to balance the budget for fiscal years 2010 — 11, 2011 — 12. The promised 4% base wage increase will be deferred from July 2010 to July 2011, and next year's base wage increase, between 3% to 5% due July 2011, will be deferred to July 2012. In return, the union acknowledges fire and EMS services will stay intact to protect public safety.

"I applaud the members of our department and the union leaders recognizing these are extraordinary times locally, statewide, regionally and federally, and that even though an agreement was made for certain wages, everyone has to share the pain," Hayes-White said. "And by doing that, by foregoing wage increases, they've assisted the administration in not having to brownout or layoff any firefighters."

The tentative agreement is still subject to approval by the membership and is expected to be voted upon by the end of this week, Hayes-White said.

"I would be surprised if it doesn't overwhelmingly pass," she said.