OLR Bill Analysis

sHB 5798

AN ACT CONCERNING DISABILITY RETIREMENT FOR CORRECTION OFFICERS.

SUMMARY:

This bill makes the law that provides extraordinary disability retirement benefits for correction officers retroactive to disabilities occurring on or after March 1, 1993. The additional benefit gives a correction officer eligible for disability retirement an increase in his benefit if the disability is considered to have created an extraordinary circumstance for him.

By law, the designation bases the disability retirement benefit on the highest pay grade of the member's bargaining unit regardless of the pay grade the member held at the time of the disabling incident. This increases the benefit for any employee who is not at the highest pay grade because pay grade is a factor in calculating a disability retirement.

EFFECTIVE DATE: Upon passage

BACKGROUND

PA 05-284

This act created the extraordinary disability retirement benefit for correction officers, modeled after a similar provision for state police officers in the police union contract.

To qualify, the disability must be the result of a “special hazard inherent in the duties of a correction officer,” and the employee must be permanently (1) disabled or unable to render service as a correction officer and (2) unable to engage in other suitable, comparable employment.

By law, the correction officers union, at its discretion, can petition the Office of Policy and Management (OPM) on behalf of an employee seeking to have the employees disability designated as an “extraordinary circumstances” disability. If OPM does not approve, the union can bring the issue to binding arbitration with the State Board of Mediation and Arbitration.

Retirement Benefits and Collective Bargaining

State employee pensions are a mandatory subject for collective bargaining and, by law, state employee contract provisions supersede contrary provisions of state law (CGS § 5-278(e)). Because the current pension contract is in force July 1, 2017, any changes in the law technically should not take effect before that date without the consent of the State Employees Bargaining Agents Coalition (SEBAC). Despite this, the legislature occasionally enacts legislation, such as with the 2003 Early Retirement Incentive Program, without first negotiating with SEBAC.

COMMITTEE ACTION

Labor and Public Employees Committee

Joint Favorable Substitute Change of Reference

Appropriations Committee

Joint Favorable