Council approves creative incentive for police, fire pension

In order to retain fire fighters and police officers longer, the City of El Paso is backing a creative incentive.

The city wants to keep officers for at least 28 years but many of them leave the city shortly after 20 years when they’re eligible for retirement. Some of them then go work for another law enforcement agency and collect their city pension.

The city council on Tuesday approved a plan they hope will entice fire and police officers to stay on, after they’re eligible for retirement. The plan would allow the officers to start accruing their pension money while still working and collecting their paycheck if they stay a few more years after they’re eligible for retirement. The pension money would accrue in the pension fund which means the city would make interest off of it.

Once the officers do leave the city, they’d receive their annual pension payment plus a lump sum from what they accrued which could be up to $200,000.

“This is nothing that we wouldn’t pay them anyway. We owe it to them and we would pay it to them no matter what. So the city benefits by keeping the people, the fund benefits by getting the interest on that and the person benefits by having a nice savings plan for just staying a few more years,” said City Rep. Michiel Noe.

The pension plan is fully funded at 20 years, so the lump sum comes from the employees continuing to have their contributions deducted from their pay during the additional years they would work.

“Training a new recruit vs having a seasoned officer or firefighter who has been on board for twenty years is invaluable and we feel ike that that this is a way to retain that value training that we’ve invested over the 20 year period,” said City Manager Tommy Gonzalez.

The plan passed unanimously.