County eyeing early retirement plan for long-term employees

EL CENTRO — As the Imperial County Board of Supervisors moves into its budgeting process for next year, the administrative staff recommended offering an early retirement incentive package to 685 employees to save several million dollars.

The incentive would be for an additional year of service credit for retirement purposes only.

According to the Golden Handshake estimated cost and savings document, the county in five years under this plan could save a combined $171.5 million in the general and non- general funds.

In year one of this plan, it would cost the county about $5.9 million for the additional year of service credit before dropping to $ 2.54 million for the each of the next four years.

There are three different groups of employees who have until the end of the year to decide if they want to opt in or out.

There are 64 employees who are 55 years old with at least 25 years of service to the county, and another

165 workers who are 50 years old with more than 20 years with the county.

There are also 456 employees who are 50 years old with 10 years of work experience for the county, but the small amount of work experience with that age would result in little benefit on their retirement years of service.

Because of this, county officials do not expect many of those 456 to opt in to the program.

County CEO Tony Rouhotas Jr. preferred the employees considering this option to make a decision within 30 days, but the supervisors voted to extend it to the end of the year.

Rouhotas said he was not going to give out the names of the employees who could take advantage of the early retirement program for privacy purposes.

County District Attorney Gilbert Otero has some concerns, especially because there could be essential employees who could opt in, which would leave his department shorthanded or replacing a seasoned prosecutor with someone with less experience just to save money.

“Not all positions are the same,” Otero said, explaining that management positions and assistant district attorneys have different responsibilities.

“You, the Board of Supervisors, have the discretion ( to decide),” he said.

Rouhotas said the county would not be hiring everyone back because it would defeat the purpose of the early retirement plan.

Assistant DA Deborah Owen, who has worked with the county for 24 years, asked if this plan would prevent future layoffs or furloughs.

The potential savings would be about $9 million, but this depends on the number of employees accepting the plan.

Rouhotas said he thinks the group of employees who are older than 55 are probably at a good spot in their lives and may be more inclined to opt in.

Supervisor Jesus Eduardo Escobar said he was in favor of the proposal.

“At the end of the day we can’t keep kicking the can,” he said. “We need to reinvent the wheel. At the end of the day (we need to decide) what is essential and non-essential.”

County Counsel Adam Crook said he is working on a waiver and that employees hired after Jan. 1, 2013, would not be eligible for the early retirement incentive plan.