>Crisis : Payouts for unused sick days
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood – total obligation, $7,203,566.23; obligation per taxpayer, $861.41
(RIDGEWOOD-NJ) The Ridgewood blog to a look to see how we got here and how this problem can be fixed. The sick time is a contractual obligation . The contract can not be opened unless both parties agree and you know that’s not going to happen. I would suspect that when these contract run out the sick time with be brought into negations. This nothing new it has been in the contract for over 30 years.
Back in the day when a police officer only got paid $11,000. 00 per year it was a nice added perk. Even though the pay was low most public sector jobs were prized for the steady work ,,pension ,healthcare and benefits .But now when police are now earning in excess of $100,000 it has become a very different story and unsustainable. .
The story gets worse because the good cops who show up every day build up a ton of unused sick days . Unfortunately their conscientious work ethic is rewarded by only getting payed out a potion of there unused days when they retire .However the guys who use their sick days up regularly could often still qualify for a nice payout if they played their cards right .
Worse still is the officer who started out making $11,000 per years 30 years ago are now getting paid over $200,000 a year and when they retire the sick days are payed out not at the $11,000 a year rate or prorated but at the $200,000 a year rate.
So the guys who shows up everyday get punished ,but if you force everyone to use there sick days you end up raking up a lot of expensive over time.
It will be very difficult going back and take away this perk and it is no secret the Ridgewood blog is no fan of public service unions , but we do think the Village should live up to its promised obligations. The simple answer is to reset new hires by continuing to push down starting salaries and perks .Moving forward look for some opportunities to buyout some older expensive contracts. In this way the Village can deliver on its promises and new hires will get accustomed to less generous packages.
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