Firefighters and law enforcement officers deserve our utmost gratitude, and usually they get it. They perform dangerous and demanding jobs with courage. They should be paid in keeping with their dedication.

The umbrella term we apply to the work that uniformed personnel do explains all — public safety.

But the well of admiration and appreciation isn’t bottomless. It can’t be. Local governments have additional responsibilities to the public, and taxpayers have limited means.

The process for deciding just what level of pay reflects the value we place on these employees needs to recognize the practical realities as well. Cities should be able to enter into that process with confidence that the outcome will be fair and reasonable for the public as well as the employees.

This week, it was announced that extended negotiations between the city of Spokane and the Spokane Police Guild had produced an apparent settlement. The City Council has yet to approve, but Guild members, who’ve gone without a contract since the end of 2006, voted 180-30 to accept the pact.

As that 6-to-1 ratio demonstrates, it’s a good deal for the officers. Their pay will rise by 1 percent more than the rate of inflation for each year of the four-year contract, retroactive to the beginning of last year. Police will contribute to their own health insurance costs for the first time, but the city will pick up more of their dependents’ health care. They’ll spend a little more out of pocket for prescriptions, as everyone is doing, but when they retire, they’ll be able to cash out more of their unused sick leave than before.

Should the public begrudge them those gains? On the surface, probably not, given the sacrifices they make.

But there are aspects of this issue that lie beneath the surface and suggest that the scales are out of balance. Had the city dug in its heels and said keeping up with inflation should be enough of a raise, the Guild could resort to a weapon called binding arbitration. A 1973 state law makes binding interest arbitration the method for settling collective bargaining impasses with police and firefighters. That process takes the decision of how much to pay certain city workers away from elected, accountable officials and gives it to an independent arbitrator.

By law the arbitrator has to examine Spokane against other cities of comparable size and composition. In Washington, that means municipalities west of the Cascades where the economy and the salaries are higher. Formulas meant to account for the cost-of-living differential are inadequate.

The result, naturally, is that Spokane does what it has to do to avoid binding arbitration and the built-in leverage it gives unions, making uniformed employee salaries one of the reasons city expenses grow faster than revenues.

The city wisely set aside $1.25 million that will cover retroactive payments the agreement calls for, but it is plugging $750,000 more into this year’s budget to pick up the pay hikes for the rest of 2007. And if the Spokane police force is beefed up by a dozen more officers — as is the plan — each of them becomes just that much more expensive.

Binding arbitration was enacted three decades ago for a sound reason. It was a reasonable way to outlaw public employee strikes that would put public safety at risk, while preserving a realistic way to resolve bargaining stalemates.

But the law requires attention. The process for identifying salary standards and assessing a city’s ability to pay should treat the employees and the public equitably.