OCEAN CITY — In what was deemed a simple housekeeping measure, Ocean City officials last week approved an amended and restated pension plan for general employees and public safety employees, but not before answering some questions about the timing of the move.
The Mayor and Council on Monday adopted an emergency ordinance amending and restating the qualified pension plans for general employees and public safety employees. The ordinance was passed as an emergency ordinance in order to meet a rapidly approaching Internal Revenue Service (IRS) filing deadline for municipal pension plans.
In simplest terms, the emergency ordinance puts in writing in a single document the various nuances and changes in the stated pension plans approved by ordinance or resolution by the Mayor and Council over roughly the last 10 years. The IRS must approve the pension plan ordinance with a filing deadline set for next week. City Solicitor Guy Ayres explained the approved emergency ordinance included no substantive changes in the plans for general employees or public safety employees.
“Nothing in the pension plans have been changed over several years,” he said. “This cleans it up and brings it into one document, a document for general employees and a document for public safety employees.”
When questioned by an audience member why the ordinance must be passed as an emergency ordinance after 10 years of subtle tweaks and changes, Ayres explained the IRS has stringent deadlines and missing the next one could set the process back.
The audience member also questioned the timing of the ordinance along with fair representation for the tax payers who help fund the employee pensions. Mayor Rick Meehan assured the audience the taxpayers’ interests were carefully tended to through the pension amendment process, including an appointed committee to review and approve the changes.
“The Mayor and Council represent the taxpayers,” he said. “The citizens appointed to the committee also represent the taxpayers.”
Councilman Wayne Hartman added the approved ordinance was merely clerical in nature and did not include any major revisions to the employee pension plans.
“This is simply housekeeping,” he said. “It puts 10 years of amendments into one simple document. The verbiage has not changed and the benefits haven’t changed. Nothing has changed.”