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Posted on 11/11/2006 10:49:46 AM PST by radar101
When San Jose police officer and military reservist Derrick Boler answered his country's call, the city promised to make up the difference between his military and police pay so his family wouldn't suffer financially from his sacrifice.
When Boler returned home after 34 months in Iraq, the city handed him a bill for more than $52,000. City officials said they overpaid him by mistake and needed him to repay the difference in three years. With interest.
``I just about had a heart attack,'' said Boler, 42, an 18-year veteran of the San Jose police.
Boler isn't the only one.
San Jose has socked several of the 73 employee reservists who have served tours of duty over the past three years with repayment demands. The city council, which has tried several times to fix the problems, will discuss the matter again at its meeting Tuesday. But council members aren't sure what to do, because their attorney says they can't just forgive the payments. .
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
Time for the city council to get a different attorney.
How exactly did the City "overpay"? By making up the difference as promised? Some other way? What?
My thoughts exactly! When their attorney announced the city couldn't "just forgive the payments" the next thing out of their month(s) should have been, "Why not?"
San Jose is and has been run by left wing haters of GW and the War in Iraq.
This will probably happen in most of the Blue Cities if San Jose can get by with this.
They spend more that on a couple of illegal alien kids in school and welcome them while spitting on this warrior.
We're dealing with nutty liberals here...which means the common man must pay for their mistakes.
Do what lefties always do when the law is against them: find a judge to declare it inoperative/unjust/unconstitutional or just discover some hitherto-unnoticed "right" that the law tramples. There must be an emanation from some penumbra they can find.
Let them pay it back at the rate of $0.01/year.
How exactly did the City "overpay"? By making up the difference as promised? Some other way? What?
Boler said he submitted at least a half-dozen military pay statements so payroll staffers could calculate the supplemental pay to which he was entitled. Instead, the city kept giving him its initial rough estimate of 25 percent of his police salary.
Boler and his wife didn't realize that a mounting mistake was being direct-deposited into their bank account. He was off fighting a war, and his wife had to take a leave from her job as a correctional officer to take care of their two sons while he was away. He said they just assumed the city's payroll department knew what it was doing.
Fellow reservist and officer Pete Lovecchio said he was lucky enough to recognize something was amiss. His military pay as a naval reserve officer was on par with his $87,000 police salary, so he didn't ask for the city's supplemental pay while out on duty. When he noticed unrequested payments being deposited in his bank account, he made sure not to spend the money. Sure enough, when he got back, the city asked him to repay $14,000.
``My trick knee just told me something was wrong,'' said Lovecchio, 51.
Another San Jose officer and reservist, Frank Keffer, said the city initially gave him a surprise payment of more than $10,000, citing an underpayment during his 17 months serving as a military police officer in Iraq. The sudden payment left him with an unexpected $4,000 tax liability. The city later told him he owed back nearly $3,000.
I think the reservists should be able to keep the money, especially since it created tax liabilities. The city council can then pay back the taxpayers the overpayment amounts from city coffers. Then the next time the city doesn't have money for some pork project, perhaps they'll be smarter.
At the very least the reservists should only be responsible for returning overpayments less tax liabilities.
No, the lawyer is right, the city can't just give away the publics money as a gift.
But, I'd bet they can 1- Have the overpayments interest free,
2- make up any loss the employee suffers (IRS, ETC)
3- Have a vote from the public on what to do.
=========================================
"City officials Friday could not provide the number of employees affected or the total amount of money owed. " 'We don't want them to have to take a pay cut to serve their country,' said Councilman Chuck Reed, the city's mayor-elect and a veteran of the Air Force. `But we can't seem to get a handle on how to do that without creating these problems.'
"State law requires cities to provide reservists full salary and benefits for as many as 30 days a year while they're gone for military activities. San Jose has from time to time extended those benefits for reservists called to active duty for longer periods....
"...San Jose agreed to pay the difference, if any, between the reservists' total military pay and what they earned as city employees. That policy, which has been amended several times since, currently extends through December 2007.
"But city officials say the matter isn't as simple as it sounds. Reservists' pay is based not just on rank and years of service but also includes additional amounts to cover housing, meals and compensation for combat and other hazardous assignments....
"The military issues statements to the reservists documenting what they are being paid for, which they then submit to city payroll staff who calculate the additional amount the city will pay....
"...Boler said he submitted at least a half-dozen military pay statements so payroll staffers could calculate the supplemental pay to which he was entitled. Instead, the city kept giving him its initial rough estimate of 25 percent of his police salary.
"Boler and his wife didn't realize that a mounting mistake was being direct-deposited into their bank account....He said they just assumed the city's payroll department knew what it was doing....
"...the city attorney's office responded that any effort to forgive the overpayments -- even due to city error -- would constitute an illegal gift of public funds. The city can establish a repayment schedule but cannot give the money away, the office said...."
It's pretty clear that the city owes these service members a "fee for services" for having assisted them in discovering that no one in the city government can add or subtract.
They need more than a new lawyer ~ they need a new civil service.
We can all relax in this case. Chuck Reed the new mayor is not perfect, but he is an Air Force Academy graduate as is his A-10 flying daughter. He is squared away on veterans and the flag and this problem is about to disappear.
Too bad they can't just reclassify it a "contract cost over-run", like they would for one of their city contractor buddies.
San Jose needs to eat their mistake. It was a cheap shot at this soldjer. Another revenge extraction.
I agree with you. Let them take it out of the illegal payments they pay their contractor buddies.
exactly
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I have a question. Why should reservists and guardsmen who work for a city get paid by the city when called to duty? The mechanic whose wife works for my doctor doesn’t get the difference paid nor does the guy who used to sell me insurance get his paid.
If one serviceman gets it shouldn’t they all get it? Why should bureaucrats get paid more than people on leave from private companies?
For example, if I take two weeks (10 business days) off of work to do my 15 days of annual reserve duty, my current employer expects me to provide a pay stub for my two weeks of reserve duty, to provide the delta between my civilian pay and my military pay.
Those two weeks include five weekend days where I was not obligated to work for my employer. It also includes bonus pays due to specific hazzardous duties my job entails. But the salary my employer uses to calculate the delta does not include my bonuses from my civilian job.
Maybe I am wrong, but I don't think weekend work with the reserves should be deducted from my salary.
Regardless, it has been my experience these reserve clauses are often very well intended, but poorly written and very difficult to implement.
When I was in the army, married and living off post, one day I didn't get a paycheck.
When I went to finance they told me they had been making a payroll mistake and that now they were correcting it, I went almost two months with zero income, that was in the days of $170.00 a month paychecks.
I never did successfully explain the army to my young wife, especially after we lost the apartment.
Of course, to most normal people, the "excess" funds would be immediately a puzzling mystery.
It is totally up to the employer to decide what they want to do with their money. There is no legal requirement on the part of the company to pay the reservist one penny once they are activated.
Regarding the mechanic and the insurance agent, it is a free labor market and if they prefer to work for an employer with better benefits (including better reserve policies), they are free to seek that employment.
"If one serviceman gets it shouldn’t they all get it?"
No. What are you suggesting, the federal goverment implement a law mandating this policy for all employers, or are you suggesting the federal goverment implement a law banning this policy for all employers? I assume that would be "fair" to you. But would it be fair to employers to restrict what pay and benefits they can choose to offer reservists?
"Why should bureaucrats get paid more than people on leave from private companies?"
They don't. I know more than one member of my reserve unit who got full civilian pay for the entire two years they were activated. I got full pay for the first 90 days of my call-up from my private sector employer. And the government workers (bureaucrats, as you call them) got much less. Some of these government workers got more when called up.
Yeah they make you "Excerpt" it.
SEVERAL companies, including SEARS, continues the soldiers pay, minus what the Military pays.
Thanks
I would be against a law mandating employers pay but was thinking more that the military should pay you what you are making when they call you up rather than normal military pay.
The Next move is for some freeper to get a hold of their personal office spending budget and see where they could have spent that 50K.
There has been talk about this, including the aborted income insurance which happened back in the late 1990s.
Personally, I think such an option would be a disaster. Imagine the issue of two military people of equal rank and skill, one making twice as much as the other solely because of his regular employment.
Then one would have to ask, if it is fair to pay one military person more because of their civilan job, would it not be equally fair to pay another one less if their civilian job payed less than their military job?
Everyone in the military reserves knows they can be called up. Also, those with good paying civilian jobs choose to stay in the reserves knowing the risk. Perhaps they like the second income, even though they may not need it. Maybe they want the retirement, especially if they spent a significant amount of time on active duty. Maybe they have more altruistic reasons.
There are numerous legal protections to prevent the loss of a house, etc., for a military reservist who is called up. On top of that, many organizations offer more. I recall one person who called their mortgage vendor to inform them they were called up and therefore their mortgage interest was subject to a federal cap during the call-up, and was told the mortgage company had a policy where a called-up reservist could defer their payments during the call-up phase. This would turn a 30-year mortgage into a 32-year mortgage, but it solved the near term cash flow problem.
This is a good idea, and solves most of the problems with people in high cost of living areas. What a concept in a free market, choose a mortage provider who has policies which are beneficial to you. Of course, this puts the responsibility on the individual.
That's a well thought out answer. Thanks
After your post I tend to agree with your position. I guess what we have is the best way to do it.
Thanks again.
Walmart and Home Depot also do the same and make up the difference if their reservist is called to active duty. Many private companies do. It's entirely up to the company they work for. It's a free country.
What to know what the law means? Never ask a lawyer.
New York City’s Reservists Are Asked to Return Iraq Pay
New York Times ^ | 23 Sep 2006 | Andy Newman Posted on 09/24/2006 8:27:44 PM PDT by GinJax
When they were called up for military service in the wake of 9/11, hundreds of uniformed city workers in the Reserves faced the suspension of their city health and pension benefits. The city offered them an option: it would keep paying their salaries and continue their benefits, but when they returned they would have to repay the city their city salary or their military pay, whichever was less. On its face, the offer made sense. And many reservists had only a few days to get their affairs together before shipping out — hardly enough time to consult accountants. Nearly all took the deal. As the war dragged on, more than 1,600 city employees, mostly police officers, signed up for the benefits program. Now the bills from the city are coming due, for far more than many veterans imagined they would have to pay — as much as $200,000 — and often for more money than they ever received.
http://www.freerepublic.com/^http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/23/nyregion/nyregionspecial3/23pay.html?ei=5088&en=8a98e78cab78455d&ex=1316664000&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&pagewanted=print
for these NYC employees ANY that are now claiming they are shocked by having to pay back their military pay to NYC while getting their full base pay and benefits must have a IQ of 62. They get 22 days a year for normal military reserve leave training (above normal vacation and sick). If called up Rudy Giuliani for the first gulf war also gave them full pay. more recently Bloomberg also did this policy. Yes they may have to do more on their IRS forms at the end of the year. Understand many stay in the reserves due to the extra reserve pay and reserve retirement they get, not thinking forward that they may actually get called up for a action such as Iraq. The part about not having to pay "more" due to "housing allowances" that are included in military income is currently being worked on I'd like to hear of a better deal anywhere for those in the guard or reserves.
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