COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC HEARING AND PUBLIC MEETING BEFORE COUNCIL COMMITTEE ON LABOR & CIVIL SERVICE - - - Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Tuesday, 1/23/2001 2:25 p.m. - - - BILL 000642 - Amending Title of the 9 Philadelphia Code, entitled "Public Employees Retirement Code," by adding new provisions to 10 restrict the ability of civilian members of Plan J and Plan Y to transfer to Plans B or D and retire 11 immediately, all under certain terms and conditions 12 Bill 000656 - Amending Title 2 of the Philadelphia 13 Code, entitled "Public Employees Retirement Code," by adding new provisions to restrict the ability 14 of civilian members of Plan J and Plan Y to transfer to Plans A and or X and retire 15 immediately, all under certain terms and conditions 16 17 18 PRESENT: COUNCILMAN DARRELL L. CLARKE, Chair COUNCILMAN FRANK DICICCO 19 COUNCILMAN W. WILSON GOODE, JR. COUNCILMAN JAMES F. KENNEY 20 COUNCILWOMAN JOAN L. KRAJEWSKI COUNCILMAN FRANK RIZZO 21 22 - - - VINCENT VARALLO ASSOCIATES, INC. Registered Professional Reporters Eleven Penn Center, Suite 600 Philadelphia, PA 19103 (215) 561-2220 2 I N D E X Linda Seyda, Personnel Director. . . . . . . . City of Philadelphia Joe Herkness, Executive Director . . . . . . . 6 Board of Pensions and Retirement City of Philadelphia 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 3 P R O C E E D I N G S
Good afternoon. Given the number of people that we have here today, we're going to move as quickly as possible because we have a lot of testimony. That was a joke. This is the hearing of the Council Committee on Labor and Civil Service. We will be hearing Bills No. 000642 and Bill No. 000656. Will the clerk please read the title of the bills.
Bill No. 000642, an ordinance amending Title of the Philadelphia 15 Code, entitled "Public Employees Retirement Code," 16 by adding new provisions to restrict the ability 17 of civilian members of Plan J and Plan Y to 18 transfer to Plans B or D and retire immediately, 19 all under certain terms and conditions. 20 And Bill No. 000656, an ordinance 21 amending Title 2 of the Philadelphia Code, 22 entitled "Public Employees Retirement Code," by adding new provisions to restrict the ability of civilian members of Plan J and Plan Y to transfer to Plans A and or X and retire immediately, all 4 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 under certain terms and conditions.
For the record, I'd like to report that Councilman DiCicco, Councilman Rizzo, Councilwoman Krajewski, Councilman Kenney, and Councilman Goode are present. Are there any individuals to testify on this particular bill? Please come forward. (Witness comes forward.)
Good afternoon. Would you please state your name for the record.
My name is Linda Seyda, and I am the Personnel Director for the City of Philadelphia.
As you know, there is renewed interest concerning the appointment of uniformed personnel who have prior City service as civilians but seek law enforcement positions soley for the purpose of enhancing their pensions. This is possible because at the time of appointment, the pension ordinance permits an employee to immediately transfer service time accrued for pension purposes as a civilian to one of the 5 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 uniformed plans. To the best of my knowledge, this did not occur when the City had a maximum hiring age of 35 for law enforcement officers because a new officer would be required to serve a minimum of years before reaching normal 7 retirement age. 8 Since the City does not currently have 9 the ability to impose a maximum hiring age, a 10 45-year-old civilian with 25 years of service becomes eligible for a pension of approximately 62 percent of a police officer recruit's salary immediately upon appointment. As a civilian, the same employee would not be eligible for a pension for an additional ten years, and the average final compensation formula would be less than that of a uniformed officer. As background for the committee, the City lost the ability to impose a maximum hiring age when the police and fire exemption to the Age Discrimination and Employment Act expired in the early '90s. When Congress reauthorized the exemption in 2996, we intended to reinstitute our previous policy. However, litigation in the Commonwealth court precluded us from doing so. 6 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 The amendment of Title 22 of the Philadelphia Code, "Public Employees Retirement Code," would eliminate the pension issue by requiring that the transferred employee remain in the civilian plan before becoming eligible for the uniform pension plan. The eligibility for disability benefits, however, would not be affected by passage of the proposed amendments. I am here today along with my colleague Joe Herkness to support the passage of Bills 642 and 656. This concludes my prepared testimony, and I am prepared to answer any questions that the committee may have at this time.
Thank you, Miss Seyda. Are there any questions of this witness by members of the committee? Councilman Kenney?
Thank you very much, Miss Seyda, and I want to thank you and Mr. Herkness and all of the departments involved for their cooperation and the creation of these bills and in the amendments which I am going to 7 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 talk about here for a moment. You had mentioned in your testimony that the initial desire of this bill was to create a five-year retirement for those people moving from non-uniformed to uniformed employment in the City of Philadelphia prior to their ability to collect the uniform pension and the benefits that accrue to uniformed officer, which have been more generous, obviously, because of the rigors and dangers of those positions as compared to working in white-collar or blue-collar positions elsewhere in the City. You mentioned the issue of five years, and one of the -- the amendment that I would like to offer -- the amendments I would like to offer at this point in time, if it's okay with the Chair, deal with the issue of disability benefits or hero provision. What we didn't want to have was someone who legitimately wanted to become a police officer or firefighter, entered into the service, and then was hurt, injured, or killed prior to five years of service. We didn't want to eliminate their ability to legitimately to take advantage of that 8 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 pension, or their family to take advantage of that pension. So what we're looking to do is on Bill 5 No. 642, on Section 22-202, paragraph f. -- and each member of the committee has a copy of this. It's the bold lettering which is added to the existing bill, or is being asked to be added to the existing bill, which says at the bottom of the first page, "Nothing in this subsection, however, shall prevent a uniformed or investigatory employee in the Police Department or in the District Attorney's Office from being considered a Police employee for the purposes of disability benefits under Chapter 22-400 or death benefits under Chapter 22-500." Bill 642 would further be amended, in accordance with this effort. On , we would be removing under j. the words "former police employees and. . . " And then in Section 3 -- I'm sorry. Section 2 would become Section 3, which would be added, "Effective date, Section 1 of this ordinance." And then,"Additionally, Section 2 of this ordinance shall apply to any police member 9 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 who's separated or separates from City employment on or after March 30, 1993, provided that the City's Medical Director did not make a determination prior to March 30, 1993 that such member was permanently and partially disabled." Additionally, an amendment to -- hold on. Just give me one moment, Mr. Chairman. (Councilman Kenney confers off the record with staff person.)
There is an additional amendment to Section 22-202, paragraph f., which deals with the DROP Program, which was instituted by Council recently and has been a very successful and popular provision that we've instituted. The last line would also read: "Such retained membership in the prior plan shall include remaining in the prior plan for eligibility and benefit calculations for any DROP participation and all other purposes of Section 21 22-310 of this title." Moving forward, Bill No. 656, which deals with the same issue we've been discussing as it relates to the fire service employees, that bill would be amended on , paragraph f., and 10 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 the bold letters would be inserted: "Such retained membership in the prior plan shall include remaining in the prior plan for eligibility and benefits calculations for any DROP participation and all other purposes of Section 7 22-310 of this title." Additionally. . . there are no 9 additional amendments to Bill No. 642 or to 656, and I would ask the Chairman to allow the witness to make some comment for the record as to the -- if you are able, for the need for these amendments.
I did have an opportunity to review the proposed amendments, and I certainly find, you know, no reason at all not to support them. I guess the one comment I would like to add for the record is that I would hope that Council moves forward with this legislation as quickly as they can, because we do have another police class scheduled to go on at the end of February -- I believe the date is February the 20th, and if this legislation could become 11 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 effective prior to that date, it would preclude the possibility of there being any further instances of the kind of activity that we've seen in the past.
Thank you, Miss Seyda. Any other questions? Councilman Rizzo?
That is a legal question, and I would have to defer to the attorneys on that. It's my understanding that it is not, but I would defer to --
I would be happy to do so, but I believe that -- I don't think it's possible. But I will follow up.
Mr. Chairman, if I may. I do understand the purposes of Councilmember Rizzo's question. I share similar concerns, I believe, with the Personnel Director and probably the Law Department that once a benefit had been granted in a legal way, it would 12 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 be difficult to take away, but I -- and I do believe the Chairman's question is whether or not within the scope of the current title of this ordinance, or these ordinances, would we be able in fact to do that, and I don't believe that's the case, but certainly we'd be able to entertain, at Councilmember Rizzo's suggestion, with guidance from Personnel and Legal, whether or not there's something we can do on a retroactive basis. But I think the main purpose of this today is to try to plug the hole going forward, especially in light of the class that's being organized now.
Thank you, Miss Seyda. Any other questions? (No further questions.)
Thank you. (Witness comes forward.) 13 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656
I just bent my glasses, I'm sorry. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. I'm Joe Herkness, Executive Director of the Board of Pensions and Retirement, and I'm present to deliver testimony on behalf of Janice Davis, the Chairperson of the Board of Trustees of the Pension System. And my testimony will be in support of Council Bills 642 and 656. Chairperson Davis has always emphasized recently to keep our testimony in times like this as short as possible, and I really have to get that done myself. I just have one paragraph or so with comments on these pieces of legislation. Mr. Chairman, these two pieces of legislation close a loophole in the present ordinance and enables a non-uniform employee vested in a non-uniform division of the pension system to transfer to the Uniform Division by simply completing hiring process for uniformed employees. Upon appointment to the Uniform Division, the employee is immediately eligible to 14 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 retire if he or she has attained the normal retirement age of the Uniform Division. Such employees are now immediately eligible, after appointment to the respective training classes of the Uniform Divisions. They're eligible for retirement after they're immediately reappointed to the respective training classes of Fire or the Police Division. This legislation establishes a five-year minimum service requirement upon non-uniform employees and after they transfer into that Uniform Division and prevents retirement immediately after appointment to those uniform classes. This legislation is supported by the Board of Pensions and Retirement, and I would strongly urge your passage of Bill No. 642 and 656. And I thank you for the opportunity to present testimony and will certainly be available for any questions and further research.
Thank you. Any questions of this witness by members of the committee? (No questions.) 15 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656
Are there any other witnesses to testify on these two bills? (No response.)
I don't know if it's appropriate, but are we the ones to request the waiver of the rules, or do we just ask the committee to waive the rules? We would like, if at all possible, to waive the rules and expedite this legislation. Thank you.
We will now move from the public hearing to the public meeting. Councilman Kenney, would you like to offer a motion on the amendments that you read into the record in the hearing?
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 16 1/23/01 LABOR, CIVIL SVC. - BILLS 642, 656 I move that the amendments to Bill No. 3 642 and 656, as read into the record during our public hearing, be approved. (Duly seconded.)
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I move that Bill No. 642, as amended, be reported out of this committee with a favorable recommendation and a request made for a rules suspension to allow for first reading at our next Council session. (Duly seconded.)
I'd like to ask for a motion on Bill 642, as amended, with a request for a suspension of the rules. That's 656, I'm sorry.
I'd like to ask for a motion on Bill No. 656 as amended.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I move that Bill No. 656, as amended, be reported out of this committee with a favorable recommendation and a request made for a rules suspension to allow for first reading at our next Council session. (Duly seconded.)
There being none, that ends our public meetings on Bills No. 642 and 656. (Adjourned at 2:43 p.m.) - - - 18 C E R T I F I C A T E I HEREBY CERTIFY that the foregoing proceedings of the Council of the City of Philadelphia of Tuesday, January 23, 2001, were reported fully and accurately by me, and that this is a correct transcript of same. RE: COUNCIL COMMITTEE ON LABOR AND CIVIL SERVICE BILL NO.'S 000642, 000656 __________________________________, JOSEPHINE CARDILLO, Registered Professional Reporter