SCTA, county butting heads over pensions

The primary dispute between Sutter County and the Sutter County Taxpayers Association has been the increase in pension payments for county employees approved by the Board of Supervisors three years ago.

The jump took employees from a “2 at 55” plan, meaning employees received 2 percent of their top salary for every year worked and are eligible to retire at age 55, to “2.7 at 55,” taking the benefit to 2.7 percent of top salary for every year worked. Safety employees, primarily sheriff’s deputies and firefighters, have a 3 at 50 pension.

The increases are retroactive, meaning employees receive benefits dating to whenever they started public employment, not from the date the increases were approved.

A subsequent change to the pension calculation earlier this year changed the system for determining the salary from an average of the three highest annual salaries to the single-highest annual salary.

If a person worked 30 years for the county and retired at an annual salary of $60,000, the pension was $36,000 per year under the old formula. Under the new formula, that same worker’s pension is $48,600.

County officials said the pension increase was necessary in order to better attract and retain employees.

SCTA said it wasn’t involved in the pension dispute at the outset, when it was passed on the consent agenda in August 2004. Treasurer Elaine Miles and Vice President Pat Miller, ardent Sutter County pension critics, said the pension was passed before they became members of SCTA.

Appeal-Democrat electronic archives show the association fighting the passage of Measure M, which established guidelines for developing a community in the south county, at that time.

Miles said she first attempted to ask questions to the board about the pension increase on her own. The first county meeting she attended lasted six hours, with County Administrative Officer Larry Combs reading a list of claims about Robert Stark’s supposed ineffectiveness as auditor-controller for more than an hour straight. Stark spoke in opposition to the pension benefits when they were approved and opposed their appearance on the consent agenda, but Combs and supervisors contend he knew about the benefits months in advance and acted as if he had suddenly discovered them right before their approval.

“I go to a meeting and there’s an inquest of Mr. Stark,” Miles said. “Nobody wants to talk about the pensions, which I want to talk about.”

Also, after that meeting, SCTA President Robert Mackensen blasted the actions against Stark in a letter to the editor in the Appeal-Democrat, calling it a “kangaroo court.”

“For two decades, Stark’s office has been the fiscal conscience of Sutter County,” he wrote. “But as County Administrator Combs has consolidated more and more power to himself over the years, the ‘conscience’ has become more and more troublesome.”

SCTA has since maintained the pension will eventually cripple the county financially.

Supervisors point to a fairly common denominator as a possible reason for SCTA’s anti-pension-raise position: Many of SCTA’s leaders are retired state employees whose pension benefits are lower than the new county pensions.

“Their pension, state pension, is actually way worse off than the PERS pension we’re into,” Supervisor Larry Munger said of the California Public Employees’ Retirement System. “We’re in better shape.”

The reason, he claims, is health benefits.

“We don’t give health benefits. I bring up health benefits to them, they don’t even want to talk about it,” he said.

“Why I think they’re upset is the fact that they’re retired, that they’re on a fixed income,” Supervisor Larry Montna said. “And the wages that we’re handing out today, they see what they made when they were in the working world and they don’t think anybody should get more than that.”

SCTA leaders said such jealousy accusations are an “interesting, not-logical accusation.”

“We have no problem with county workers getting a decent wage and decent benefits,” Miller said. “We worked for the government, we expected to get decent pay and decent benefits. The issue is the fiscal accountability, bottom line.”

Miles called her 2 at 60 pension “fabulous.”

To argue the financial impact of the new 2.7 at 55 pensions, Miller said she retired from CalTrans after 34 years, but before the age of 60, meaning she only received 1.5 percent per year worked, putting her pension at 51 percent.

“If I were working for the county, I would be getting probably around 84 percent,” she said.

“And that difference would certainly buy an insurance policy many times over at that age,” Miles added.

SCTA also says it doesn’t make sense to lower the retirement age to 55 when people are living longer.

“People are able to work into their 60s, most people,” Miller said.

“It’s not jealousy we’re talking about here,” Miles said. “It’s fiscal responsibility.”

SCTA is clear it wants to see the pension amount reduced and returned to a three-year formula.

Those already hired cannot have their pension reduced without the unions voting to do so. But pensions can be lower in negotiations for future hires.

“I would play real hardball and they would never have another contract with the county until they gave that concession in,” Miles said.

SCTA is also pointing to a recent development in Orange County where the Board of Supervisors voted to challenge a retroactive pension increase given to sheriff’s deputies by a previous board, saying retroactive benefits violate the state constitution. If courts rule in the county’s favor, retroactive pension benefit agreements statewide could be declared void.

Appeal-Democrat reporter Robert LaHue can be reached at 749-4713. You may e-mail him at rlahue@appealdemocrat.com