City council took care of some union business at their meeting Tuesday night -- including working on new contracts for city employees to account for recommended pay raises.

In an executive session, council went over a new collective bargaining agreement for ports and harbors employees represented by the Inlandboatmen’s Union of the Pacific.

Council also talked about a new contract for parks, culture and recreation employees represented by the International Union of Operating Engineers.

The independent compensation study, completed last year, says both those groups and other city workers are underpaid.

After last night’s executive session, council voted to approve the new IBU agreement for ports employees. Assistant city manager Patrick Jordan says it accounts for the compensation study’s recommendations.

And he says council gave him the go-ahead to talk to the Operating Engineers union about pay raises for the PCR employees. The group includes some library workers and recreation assistants and coordinators.

Those employees are in the midst of a new three-year contract that the city negotiated with their union just last summer. But Patrick Jordan says the city told the union they’d want to re-open the contract once the compensation study was finished.

With council's permission last night, he says that's what he'll do now. He plans to send a letter to the union, asking to negotiate a new agreement to incorporate the study’s recommended raises.