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Rehire Planning Champion

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 18, 2009

What should have been an easy decision to keep Bob Hunter employed as head of the City-County Planning Commission has been complicated by state pension rules that most of us workers in the private sector find overly generous.

Hunter, 66, officially stepped down in December and after a month of retirement is legally eligible to be rehired at his old job. The appointed planning commissioners will decide today what to do. We strongly recommend he be rehired.

It is important to separate criticism of the pension rules with criticism of Hunter, who has for 21 years been a champion of responsible growth and citizen participation in local government.

As current president of the American Planning Association, Hunter is a walking encyclopedia of what plans have worked or flopped in other parts of the country. Hunter has advocated better transit, urban growth limits, and fair impact fees, all of which are popular with the public.

He created a model set of ethical rules and left behind a well-run agency.

The only objections we have heard to his rehiring involve the state pension plan, not his ability or agenda. With more than 30,000 public employees in Florida signed up for the same program called DROP, to single out Hunter suggests an ulterior motive to weaken local growth rules.

More than 8,000 workers in the state pension system have been rehired after officially retiring, and are collecting paychecks as well as pension checks.

Hunter tells us if rehired with a year-to-year contract he would refuse contributions toward a second state pension and doesn't need medical coverage. Keeping him could well cost taxpayers less than hiring someone new.

As for DROP, we have urged lawmakers to order a detailed accounting of the Deferred Retirement Option Program to find out how much it costs taxpayers, or how much it saves. The voluntary plan allows workers eligible for retirement to collect both pension payments and paychecks, generally for a maximum of five years. The retirement money accumulates in a second account but no longer increases based on higher pay or tenure, so the pension benefit is capped.

One of the odd quirks in the plan is the definition of retirement: at least one month off the job. Then the worker is eligible to return and after a year, begin also collecting pension checks.

Hunter's critics are making it sound as if he figured out a unique way to game the system. In fact, the system is full of rules that best serve upper management and elected officials, and everyone in government knows it.

The pensions of elected officials grow much faster than the pensions of ordinary workers, and it is extremely easy for elected officials to keep working and getting pension checks indefinitely. But you sure don't hear very many elected officials complaining about that. Hunter's retirement choice was the same as for other workers covered by the state pension plan. Five years ago he had to choose whether he would join DROP or not.

For higher paid workers, DROP is a deal hard to beat. You can fault the state for offering it but can't fault Hunter and many others government workers in Hillsborough County for taking it.

DROP comes with no guarantee that participants' old jobs will still be available to them, but it clearly allows employers the option to offer.

Few such offers are made to rank-and-file workers who are easily replaced. But they are free to find other jobs, even other jobs covered by state pensions. Age discrimination is illegal.

The issue today is not whether the Legislature should reform DROP. Of course it should. The issue is only whether board members should negotiate to rehire Hunter, who has given them a well-run, independent-minded planning agency, or take a chance on someone else.

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