Fort Walton Beach Resolution — 83-10-Ethel Martin Survivor Benefits — reading text

RESOLUTION NO. 83-10 A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING A SPECIFIC PERSON TO CONTINUE RECEIVING PENSION PAYMENTS NOT AUTHORIZED BY THE PENSION PLAN WHEREAS the City Council has received a report dated January 27, 1983, notifying the Council that an error was made commencing December, 1974 by which the widow of a City employee received payments from the City in the monthly amount of $11.56, which amount was not authorized by the Pension Program, and WHEREAS the City is not aware of the way or ways in which the error occurred but is of the opinion that the widow of the employee may have established her budget in reliance upon the City's payment, and WHEREAS the error was clearly that of the Travelers Insurance Companies and the City and not that of the recipient of the unauthorized payment, and WHEREAS this exception to the terms of the Pension Program is not intended to create a precedent for future waivers or exceptions, NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED: SECTION 1: That the payments presently being made by the City of Fort Walton Beach, Florida be allowed to continue without change which will continue the Travelers Annuity and payment by the City of Eleven and 56/100 ($11.56) at the same time from the Retirement and Pension Plan of the City of Fort Walton Beach, Florida, to Ethel M. Martin, widow of Odis B. Martin, who retired on October 1, 1973, and who deceased on November 13, 1974, This resolution shall become effective upon its approval by the Council and upon signature by the Mayor. ADOPTED Daweh. 6, [FES MAYOR é Ya) GAT oe tort nce neces ATTEST: [DISPOS: Trou | IG UL. | SS Pews's w Files City Clerk Lm kissd Say The form and sufficiency of the foregoing has been reviewed and}... approved by the City Attorney. ! na entering pm emen censanimne Seta O Ce D. Michael Chesser . re) ‘@) RESOLUTION NO, 83-10 A RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING A SPECIFIC PERSON TO CONTINUE RECEIVING PENSION PAYMENTS NOT AUTHORIZED BY THE PENSION PLAN WHEREAS the City Council has received a report dated January 27, 1983, notifying the Council that an error was made commencing December, 1974 by which the widow of a City employee received payments from the City in the monthly amount of $11.56, which amount was not authorized by the Pension Program, and WHEREAS the City is not aware of the way or ways in which the error occurred but is of the opinion that the widow of the employee may have established her budget in reliance upon the City's payment, and WHEREAS the error was clearly that of the Travelers Insurance Companies and the City and not that of the recipient of the unauthorized payment, and WHEREAS this exception to the terms of the Pension Program is not intended to create a precedent for future waivers or exceptions, NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED: SECTION 1: That the payments presently being made by the City of Fort Walton Beach, Florida be allowed to continue without change which will continue the Travelers Annuity and payment by the City of Eleven and 56/100 ($11.56) -p}is— 34 } 4 he Eighty and-69/100-($80-69}-at the same time from the Retirement and Pension Plan of the City of Fort Walton Beach, Florida, to Ethel M. Martin, widow of Odis B. Martin, who retired on October 1, 1973, and who deceased on November 13, 1974. This resolution shall become effective upon its approval by the wren Le fucar A2, /7 62 THE CITY COUNCIL ATATHE REGULAR MARCH 8, 1983, MEETING RATIFIED YAIS RESOLUTION WITH THE SN, ts Ela lax STRICKEN LANGIAGE JAS SHOWN, BY MOTION. MAYOR SYV Z/LI03 Council and upon signature by the Mayor. CITY CLERK The form and sufficiency of the foregoing has been reviewed and approved by the City Attorney. D. Michael Chesser © OQ 83-10 Attorney read Resolution 83-10 by title: Mr. Franklin moved for adoption. Motion seconded by Mr. Grant. The Mayor indicated she had been told th @ today they could be sued. She asked Mr. Bechtel if he could speak to that. The Manager said possibly the City Attorney could address that. if they were spending funds. The Mayor said she had not really considered that since she did not vote on it but wondered if the Council had. The Manager said to give a hypothetical case, if an employee were contributing money to that fund and those funds were being paid out to someone else who didn't qualify under the pension plan he was not sure what the liability might be but the City Attorney would have to answer that. Mr. Franklin said he was not sure if the lady qualified or not, and he didn't feel at the present time anybody could give him an answer on that whether she was or not. The Mayor said she didn't qualify but they decided that it would be - - Mr. Franklin - Has someone given us that opinion, Mayor. The Mayor-as I understood and she asked Mr. Evans who said -Mr. Lindsey gave the Trustees several alternatives and the committee met last week and recommended they take no. 1 as shown in the resolution to pay it. Mr. Franklin said he's our insurance advisor - Mr. Evans said he is the pension consultant. Mr. Franklin said they were acting on the Pension consultant's - one of his recommendations. Mrs. Thornber said there had been an error made through no fault of anyone sitting here and the intent of the committee was to rectify the error and not penalize the person to whom this money had been given - would it help at all if the money did not come out of the pension fund and came out of the general fund. The Mayor - she's an elderly lady and it is a small amount really very dificult for her to work, but they might be more legal to just take it out of the general fund. The Clerk said it really came out of the General Fund because the City keeps it actuarially sound. , and the amt of money she contributes - or her husband contributed was probably only a few hundred dollars, whatever you do it is city funds. The City Attorney said he did not think that was entirely true - I think the situation is that a good deal of it would be city funds a portion of it would be employee funds and I would assume that the way to get around th @ dss would be to make this resolution address itself directly to that by requiring in the resolution that the City increase its amount of contribution to the pension plan by the amount of 11.56. (City Clerk, well you can do that ) per month. Mrs. Thornber asked if that could be included in the motion, could this resolution be- amended to read thusly. City Attorney, yes,xxkxgmmt could be amended to read that to provide that the 11.56 addition contribution would be made by the City to the plan and that's probably the way to get around it. « > acto . @) o) For the information of some of those people th & may not know what has happened, what it is all about basically is that a pension plan in a rather small amount was begun by accident to a person who was I understand not technically qualified to the plan and had been receiving it for a number of years and that problem came to light when the whole system was computerized taken out of the manual system that had been followed before that and because of the computerization of that system we were for the first time made aware of the fact that there is an unauthorized payment being made in the amount of 11.56 as I understand it. and the question now is do we cut the lady off who has been receiving payment for quite a number of - I may bring you an ordinance, I hate to pass an ordinance for 11.56 for a specific purpose - you may be sued no matter what happens. City Manager, that is right. You can pass the ordinance, I'm sorry, if you decide to do nothing the lady may well take the position that it was our mistake and she would proceed against the city although I expect that would not occur. City Manager, I agre but I am just throwing those matters open so you know what you are facing but I think the amount is more than 11.56. City Clerk - what he is saying, what happened when the City changed the payment going from Travelers to the City and we are now paying that portion which is 11.56 and that has been paid 2 months and of course we discussed it and decided we had nothing to do but continue it. until council made a decision, so the 11.56 went directly to the individual from the pension plan for Jan. and Feb. and of course the new one is due Monday. Reason we want to make the decision on the thing because first day of Nov. we were hoping to have the thing converted over but as I said since Jan. and Feb. we have been paying it, prior to that all payment were made by Travelers who set money aSide but when they set it aside they didn't set aside that 11.56. City Manager, so actually it is more than 11.56, isn't it 80.00 plus the 11.56. City Clerk, right. City Manager 91.00. Mayor, I think the feeling of Council was that they do not want to take that money away her but we would like to pay it in a fashion that we would not be obligated to pay it to anybody else. if a mistake was made. Baughman - the amount we are talking about in this «reso- lution is 11.56? City Attorney - I am not sure - I started being sure but now apparently Travelers has set an amount in excess of that aside that they are also paying. I don't know the source of those funds. City Clerk - If you read Section 1 it will give you the whole store that Council agreed to do last Tues night. We took Section 1 out of the 4th proposal that Mr. Lindsey had. and section 1 is the second propoposal out of the 4 proposals. Thornber - we thought we were voting on 11.56, now as it turns out it isa different amount of money. City Manager, it's - City Clerk , if you read the information we are paying 11.56 out of the pension plan, back when the city bought ‘o) QO 3 83-10 these annuitites back in Travelers' did - they set aside so many dollars to buy that annuity, all in good faith, so Travelers' set aside that many dollars to buy the annuity; at time I believe it was 72.00. Since that time the 3% cost of living went in there for 3 or 4 years and that was there the 11.56 comes from. It was 4 years of 3% cost of living. That's where the 11.56 comes from. The total amount is about 84.00. Mr. Baughman - and that's what we are voting on? Mayor, well who is paying the difference between them? City Clerk - It is money Travelers already had set aside years ago when they bought the annuity - came out of the Pension plan back in - Mayor - that is what we are trying to do is to figure how we can pay the lady - what is she, 69 years old? - City Clerk - She will be 70 in March. Mayor, we felt while we passed this that we did not want to take this money away from her because it actually is necessary that she have it to live; she is not able to go out and work. City Manager - I would certainly like to see the City continue tis and pay her althought I also hate to see us not covered where you could get yourself involved in a lawsuit. Mr. Grant - It has been brought up in reference to litigation. Is it on this $11.56 or on the legality of the $80.69? Is that wheee the heartburn is? City Attorney - I've never heard that anybody had a problem with the thing. but I can assume if someone is going file a lawsuit surely they will file a lawsuit on everything they can get can include. There is a way perhaps to get around the problem this evening, since apparently everyone has agreed that you want to keep doing it on a temporary basis I might suggest that you do go ahead and and do it this evening by res. and then by ordinance which does the same thing between now and the next meeting and betwean now and then Charlie you might want to discuss with each one of us where the difference between the 92.00 and the and 11.56 is. Evans - I know what that is. Mayor - but the Council doesn't seem to. Franklin, I do. Baughman, I so move exactly what the City Attorney said. Motion seconded by Mr. Franklin ,Motion carried unanimously. Mr. Baughman left the mtg. at 8:05 p. m. City Clerk - Madam Mayor, this particular matter