Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell on Tuesday formally opposed letting local governments force police, teachers and other workers to foot part of the bill for their own pensions, responding to a lobbying campaign by public employee groups who said the change amounted to a pay cut.
The budget provision would have given localities the option to mandate employees put up to 5 percent of their pay toward the retirement system, a cost now borne by the cash-strapped counties.
McDonnell, rolling out a larger set of proposed adjustments to Virginia’s two-year spending plan, said the shift would renege on a long-standing promise that public employers would cover their work force’s share of the contribution. The governor, however, said he supports having future state and local employees pay into the plans.
“It’s hard enough in this economy to be competitive with other agencies or with the private sector, which might be able to offer better salaries,” said Dana Schrad, executive director of the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police, one of the groups that lobbied McDonnell to strip out the provision. “The only things we’ve really been able to offer … for local law enforcement officers has been decent benefits.”
The Virginia Education Association also cheered the governor’s move, while the Virginia Association of Counties complained it would hamstring local authority. The county group supports allowing local governments “to make decisions on their own that affect their bottom line,” said Michael Edwards, deputy director for legislative affairs.
The General Assembly will convene in a week for a single-day session to consider McDonnell’s proposed tweaks.
McDonnell had been slowly releasing the details of those fixes over recent days. They include reinstating a employer tax deduction to encourage domestic production, which had been phased out in the legislature’s approved budget. Bringing back the deduction will cost $10 million in fiscal 2012, the governor said.
McDonnell also wants to put $1.5 million toward the agency overseeing mine safety to hire more mine inspectors, among other measures. That proposal was a reaction to a West Virginia coal mine explosion last week that killed 29 miners.
