http://www.rutlandherald.com/article/20150209/NEWS02/702099983
Published February 9, 2015 in the Rutland Herald
Springfield amends sick time accrual policy
By SUSAN SMALLHEER
Staff Writer
SPRINGFIELD — The town has changed its sick time accrual policy to avoid running up big, unfunded balances.
The town currently has a total of $473,795 for accrued sick time, down from $503,658 from the previous year, said Town Comptroller Jeffrey Mobus.
Former Springfield Select Board Chairman John Follett had raised the issue last month during budget sessions.
Follett said Wednesday he was concerned that Springfield had a big, unfunded benefit on its books, but lacked the money to pay it.
“I became aware of it because there’s been a lot of national publicity and in the financial world about similar situations in Detroit and Chicago,” said Follett, who stepped down from the board about a decade ago.
“Many town and city governments have promised people benefits, and there’s no money set aside to fund those,” he said.
“The only reason I bring it up is it’s part of what’s going on nationally,” he said. “Do we have any of those liabilities?”
Mobus prepared an assessment of the situation for the Select Board last month, noting that the town had already changed its 30-year-old policy that allows employees to bank up to 90 days of sick time, and once they retire, are able to be paid for that time.
Mobus said all the accrued sick time from town employees is currently at $656,403, but he deducting $190,000 from that amount because he said several of those employees are not expected to retire from the town.
Only employees who retire from the town are eligible for the pay out, and not if they leave for other reasons, he said.
Retirement is defined under the Vermont Municipal Employees’ Retirement System, which has different standards for different types of jobs, Mobus said.
The town has about 100 employees, and about one person retires every year.
Mobus noted the town during contract talks with its unionized employees had changed the amount of banking sick days to a maximum of five days, with the exception of the police union.
The contract with the police still allows officers to bank up to 90 days of sick time, but it limits the pay out at retirement to 50 percent of up to 40 days.
He said the new policy doesn’t affect current employees.
He said there is more of a trend of employees taking sick time to care not just for themselves but family members.
He said while the sick time liability has not created a budgetary challenge because the town has adopted a policy of not replacing the retiring employees until the new hire fits into the remaining budget for the position.
“This has meant that a position remains open for several months and that the remaining employees do the best they can to replace the work lost,” Mobus wrote in his Jan. 22 letter to the Select Board.
This glaring insensitivity to our municipal employees makes me sick. I just wish I had enough sick time accrued to cover it!
ReplyDeleteAnd they should not get paid for unused sick at retirement. None of the rest of us get that benefit. Vacation yes, sick no.
ReplyDeleteAgree, 99% of company policies allow vacation to be accrued.
DeleteSick pay is NOT carried over year to year. Again Springfield is in the 1% field. SICK, no pun attended.
Yeah! Let's have a dog in the manger attitude about this! What fun is a race to the bottom if some people are going slower than others? And why stop there? Let's get rid of paid vacations, too! And if any town employee objects to being treated like a peasant, let's just replace him with a real peasant.
ReplyDeleteEvery man is against sick leave accrual-- until he gets sick.
People who don't have sick leave should fight for it-- they deserve it, and certainly they deserve it when the sick person happens to be their child.
When I got sick as a child, if I was lucky, I got to spend the time in the school nurse's office. As a parent, I got a call from the high school saying my son was sick. I told them I'd be there as soon as I got off work. My supervisor called me in: "The union contract says that you can use sick leave to take care of your sick child. It's all right if you do that."
I was amazed.
The unions 100% insurance demands did not help the future of this town. Nor will some sneaky clause to carry sick time over help the future of this town.
Deletethe town employees don't have 100% insurance
Deleteits not sneaky, its been this way over 30 years
Delete6:18 : I was implying the unions in the shops, like Bryant, Fellows and J&L. If I was able to get paid for all the sick days I did not take, I would have quite a bank roll. But don't take me wrong, those with a long term health issue should be provided for.
DeleteSick time should not accumulate, use it or lose it. When you retire nothing should be given to you.
ReplyDeleteThat's how private businesses work and the town should do the same thing.
This should start with new employees and not effect the existing ones.
5:21, that's exactly the provision that was in my union's contract. After 25 years, I had accumulated two years of sick time-- and had only used about three weeks of it. ( My kid was very healthy, fortunately.) I didn't get a nickel for it when I retired. There was also a clause that said we could donate our vacation time as sick leave for our co-workers.
ReplyDeleteI think the best thing that could have happened to Precision Valley would have been the unions buying the plants and running them as employee-owned cooperatives. They would have known exactly what needed to be done.
LOL! The inmates surely would have run the asylum into the ground with their incessant squabbling and carping. To imagine otherwise is to defy the reality of the natural tendencies of the union beast - sloth and selfishness!
DeleteThere are a large number of employees in Vermont who are in the same boat I used to be in-- with nobody as backup when their child falls ill. Many employers are liberal toward their employees and let them take the time off to handle a crisis, but many are not. For the employees of those latter employers, a union is an absolute necessity.
DeleteWell, in that case, 11:05, the result would have been the same as Textron et al. doing what they did. However, I think that when all the workers realized they would have nobody else to blame and they couldn't strike against anybody but themselves, they would have done excellently as a number of existing employee cooperatives are now doing.
DeleteThere is a difference between accumulating sick time from year to year for use when an employee or an employee's child becomes sick, and unused accumulated sick time being paid as a bonus upon retirement.
ReplyDeleteI remember a supervisor at Bryant that had spent years as a machine operator, then years as a supervisor. He was never sick. Then he suffered a severe back injury while at home, and his accumulated sick time supported him and his family for over six months while he recovered, and his company supplied medical insurance paid his medical bills. When he returned to work, no one said or thought he had abused the system.
If sick time cannot be accumulated, how many current employees will use the yearly sick days as extra personal days? How many days must an employee be sick before he needs a doctor's note to return to work? How is the town going to control increased absenteeism as employees use sick days as personal days? Sounds like the new town manager will have some interesting challenges.
Clearly, 6:18, points which the Best of Springfield do not consider when they make their arguments here.
DeleteAs military officers know, if you don't treat the enlisted right, they have ways of getting back at you. Treat workers like scum, and you'll find the business going to hell.