It's Your Money

 We would like to thank all of those that supported our call to protest the proposed Stormwater assessment - and the County Commissioners for their good judgement in unanimously defeating it. Following that decision and the forced reductions in the 2010 budget that it caused we hear and read that the County has cut expenses as far as it can without severely affecting essential services. Since Public Safety (Sheriff, Fire/Rescue and Constitutional) functions account for approximately 70% of the County budget this thought is often expressed when discussing revenue projections and the new Fire Service Assessment this is being proposed for next year.

Martin County’s property values continue to decline and we are only 3 months from the Appraiser’s assessment (January 2010) that will determine the revenue from our 2011 Ad Valorem taxes. Most other tax collections (sales/fuel/etc) are also down and the Fire/EMS budget is set to dramatically rise as the federal grant for those 33 new personnel hired this year runs out and other contractual pay increases kick in. All of these facts make it essential to take on this fallacious argument now.

The supposition being put forward is that, since the vast majority of all County operating budgets, especially the Fire/EMS (95+%), are made up of personnel costs, any future reduction in revenue will require increased/new taxes, or layoffs that will reduce essential services. We believe this is a false choice. The solution being avoided, or at least not being addressed, is the TOTAL personnel cost that consumes over 85% of all of the operational budgets we have examined. Pay is not necessarily the issue, although there are certainly some excessive County salaries. However, the really expensive excesses are hidden in the benefit packages that dwarf anything available in the private sector. These include generous retirement plans, overtime pay for management personnel, individual and family health coverage, automatic longevity pay increases, and accrued paid vacation, personal and sick days. The majority of these excesses occur in the Public Safety areas and most are guaranteed by union contracts that cannot be immediately renegotiated. There are areas, however, where these excesses can be quickly modified and the unions involved should be put on notice that the next round of negotiations will be different.

Retirement plans, especially those for “hazardous duty” personnel are largely dictated by the State, but the work rules that invite overtime in the final years of those with high salaries can be adjusted. Also, Martin was the first, and may still be the only County that requires their lifeguards to be fully qualified EMS paramedics, which automatically provides them with the same expensive hazardous-duty pay and retirement afforded Law Enforcement and other Fire/Rescue personnel. This HD plan allows retirement at 25 years service with 75% (90% at 30 years) of their highest 5 years pay (including overtime and other pay enhancements) and full family benefits. The cost to the County for buying-in those 17 lifeguards several years ago was some $400,000 the first year.

The County has instituted some higher deductible/co-pays in their health plan, but there are additional modifications that would save funds and not greatly affect employees. While there is justification for allowing vacation days to be saved for a limited period, personal and sick days should be used when necessary, not accumulated and/or turned into cash. In our first cursory look at the County’s 900 person banked time account we identified over 50,000 hours (over 1000 work weeks – nearly 20 years) accrued by just the top 10% (30 of 300) Fire/Rescue personnel. One alternative would be to grandfather those hours/days, but immediately stop the bleeding everywhere they legally can and bargain it out of future union contracts.

In summary, we want to see a reduction in TOTAL personnel costs, not increased taxes, fees or assessments. While some layoffs or furloughs may be necessary or even desirable, a better idea is to preserve the good employees required to maintain essential services by reducing excessive benefits and automatic raises. We believe all government employees should receive a salary commensurate with their job and responsibilities - AND COMPARABLE WITH LOCAL CIVILIAN POSITIONS – INCLUDING THEIR BENEFIT PACKAGES.