I strongly support the Salary Commission in raising salaries for the 30 county employees, including the fire chief, police chief, mayor and City Council, as described in The Garden Island on Thursday, Feb. 25. For both chiefs it would represent
I strongly support the Salary Commission in raising salaries for the 30 county employees, including the fire chief, police chief, mayor and City Council, as described in The Garden Island on Thursday, Feb. 25. For both chiefs it would represent a 1.6 percent increase every year for the past seven years.
The article also noted that in both the fire and the police departments there were employees that made substantially more than the chief and the deputy chief as a result of overtime.
While this is true, the much greater problem, and not probably being accounted for actuarially, is that a firefighter and a police officer can, under the current system, retire after 30 years of service with a pension greater than the chief will receive after 40 years of service. Not good and not fair.
In way of background, the police and the firefighters union in Hawaii have done a superb in representing the interests of their members in their contract negotiations in the area of retirement. They negotiated two clauses that individually seemed fair, but together they create a tremendous cost to the public.
Those two clauses are: 1) Retirement based upon last year of earnings, and 2) Overtime must be given to volunteers first. As a result it is a perfect opportunity to “game” the system and it is working.
On one’s last year one can take unlimited overtime and double one’s earning for retirement. Instead of retiring at $45,000 per year after 30 years of service (plus health insurance for life and annual increases based on the consumer price increase) one can retire at $90,000 a year. I also suspect that the governments actuarial set aside is based upon their last year’s salary rather than their last year’s earning. So a great unfunded liability.
The City of San Diego had this same situation with police officers and firefighters with receiving pensions up to $101,000 after 30 years of service.
In fact, I have a friend that received exactly that — retiring at age 51 after 30 years of service. San Diego, in the late 1990s, was facing the possibility of bankruptcy because of this unfunded liability.
Legally they could not change a contract in place, but they negotiated a new contact — on a take it or leave it basis — that stated that all new fire and police personnel’s retirement would be based on their last three years of earnings.
Perhaps the contract negotiators for management will insist on such a clause here in Hawaii.
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Joe Frisinger is a resident of Princeville.
