001I don't know what's going to happen. in a district and still be able to keep the insurance. The vesting schedule is the part that determines how much premium the board is going to contribute when that person becomes a retiree. And this is strictly when people retire, not when they resign. It's a retirement issue. So the current policy is that if an employee works for us less than six years at the time of retirement, the school board pays zero for their insurance policy as a retiree. So the retiree pays the 100% portion of however much that insurance plan costs for premium each month. Once they hit six years, then the board picks up 20% of the board share that you would typically pay for a retire and each year it goes up by 20%. Again, this
002is the board's portion. Once an employee hits 10 consecutive years at the time of retirement, then the board's share is 100% of that side. The employee still pays their premium just as an active employee does. So if someone comes to us with 20, 22, 23, 25 years of experience, they got to work 10 more years in order to get to that vesting. feedback that I received was that we've got some experienced people out there who are interested in coming to our district, but because they're in that 20 and above years of experience, they're not in a position of work 10 additional years. During the process of having these discussions, I ended up in a phone conversation with the superintendent in St. James Parish. St. James was facing similar issues. You know, they're similar to us
003with the tax base and with the ability to pay more in competitive salaries, but they were facing the issue with experienced personnel not coming because their vesting schedule was actually 15 years. So their superintendent, you know, told me they changed their policy recently to be able to give credit to very experienced employees to go towards the vesting schedule. So the St. James Parish policy states that employees can get up to 50% of public or private experience verified experience related credit not to exceed 10 years. So theirs their numbers work a little bit different because they have a 15-year vesting schedule. So for them, if they get somebody in who's got 20 years of experience, they can get 50% of that credited, which would be five years. Then they got to work 10 for them. Okay?
004If they come in with 30 years experience, 50% of that would be 15, but their cap is 10. So they ensured that if an employee came with experience credits, they still had to work five years in that school district upon retirement to be able to get the 100% vested. So based upon that, Brad and I spoke again. He and he and I spoke again this morning. He couldn't be here today because he's got a meeting in Baton Rouge that he could not reschedule. He sees no adverse financial impact on the district because you're not adding employees on. Basically, what you're doing is you may be replacing someone who left with an experienced teacher as opposed to a brand new one, which will cost us a little bit more in salary. But I think that's a
005cost that's worth it if we can get more experienced teachers in our classroom and experienced bus drivers, experienced school food service workers, whoever they may be. But we want to ensure that they can't just come in, pop in a year, and leave and get 100%. So the language that you see that I sent you all in a few email correspondences would indicate that they can receive previous tenure credit from their private their prior employer private or public of 25% of previous relevant years of service for up to five years. And then the vesting percentage would be determined from the table above at the date of retirement. What that means is if a person comes to us and they've got 20 years of experience, 25% of that would be four years. So they'd have to work
006six. If they came in with 24 years, 25% of that would be what? Six years, but they maxed at five. So they still have to work five years. Okay, if they came in with I think it's 22 years would give them the five. They still got to work 5 years. Okay, but this would give credit towards the vesting schedule with really the the main intent of being able to recruit more experienced teachers following the board's approval of this latest pay raise. I've had board members tell me they've been contacted by people from other districts who used to work here at some point who wanted to come back, but this 10-year thing is the holdback. And when I spoke to our payroll and and uh insurance, you know, departments, they started getting phone calls right after
007that raise was announced because, as you all know, that was very highly publicized by the media out of Baton Rouge. And even as recently as last week, an article was published showing the the regional salaries. So I'm asking the board to consider either this language or whatever iteration of it that you would like to provide for external credit to apply towards the vesting schedule in an effort to recruit more experienced personnel in any position. Miss Laws. Um, so Dr. V, you gave um several examples, but none of your examples was less than 20. So, yeah. So, the ultimate goal is that this will only apply to 20. Okay. But it will go less than 20. It just will be whatever 25% is of that correct number of years. So if a person had I'll use
008simple numbers, four years of experience. Okay. 25% of that be one year. Okay. So they got to work nine. Mhm. If a person comes in with 10 years, you know, 25% of that is two and a half. You know, they have to work seven and a half years. Okay? So yes, it would apply, you know, for people with less than that, right? But we don't generally have this issue with people with less than 20 years, right? Because of the eligibility to retire, so most people work 30 years or they work 25 because they've reached age 55. People who come in with eight years of experience, they got to work more than 10 years in order just to be eligible to retire. Even for an early retirement, you have to put in at least 20 years
009in the retirement system. Okay? So those people would actually work 10 or more years anyway. So as it is now, the mic. So as it is now so if you work like 9 years now so um 25% of n the mic miss so if you work in if you work like nine years now as it is now 10 years so how what what do you have to do to become um vested now Number one, you have to be eligible to retire. So most people with only 10 years of service wouldn't be eligible to retire. So if they work 10 years for us right now, now they've met the 100% vesting, but they probably got to work 10 more years for a total of 20 to be eligible for early retirement. There used to be a
010provision that at 60 years old, you could retire with 10 years out of the teachers retirement system. But the retirement eligibility over the last 7 years has changed three times. It's like 62 now, right? Depending upon when you hire. Okay. Yep. And I'm sure as time progresses, it's going to change more. If you only retire now, your benefit is cut dramatically. So if so, what's it going to be the difference, but the way we doing it now? So the way we do it today, if a person came in to us with 25 years of experience, planning on retiring with 30 years which means they plan on working five more years. They'd have to work 10 more to hit the 100% vesting on the insurance. Okay, we want to get it down to five. Oh, we
011trying to get it down to five. This would get it down to five and really would only truly impact you people who have well over 20 years of experience. Okay, this really doesn't benefit a person with less than 20 years because they would have to work those 10 anyway to be eligible to retire. Okay, thank you. And I I do want to make this note because I was asked a question. I I don't remember who asked it, but if a person let's say went into teaching later on in life or went into being a power professional later on or a maintenance worker later on in life and they came in with 25 years as a a war operator for one of the plants, you know. So they come in us and they're 55 years old
012or 60 years old. Well, they got to hit a certain number of years working to retire anyway. All right. Once they hit 65, they go on humanity. Mhm. So, there's really no negative effect for hiring somebody that might be a lot more experienced because they're going to end up on that Humanana plan anyway, which saves the board quite a bit of money. We would pay more for them as an active than of course with them on Humanana. Absolutely. And doc, I I think from the very beginning of this administration coming in, they you you guys have tried to figure out ways and ideas to get the most qualified, best teachers here to help our students. And I think this idea is another way to help our students. My first concern was when we discussed this
013was cost. First thing that popped in my head. I reached out to our consultant Mr. Dagel and after a lengthy conversation, the bottom line is he feels the cost will not increase with this vesting schedule. And I am in agreement with the verbiage that's on here. Now, Mr. Del and I have had multiple conversations and and he he does not see any adverse thing. Now, he will say this and and I agree completely. None of us have a crystal ball to know what we're going to deal with. We can hire a person who's fresh out of college that will work for us potentially for 30 years. that could come in with some issues that cost the insurance plan a lot. We could also hire someone with 25 years experience that cost the plan almost anything.
014So, uh the only cost that could potentially be a little more is in salary because you would pay an experienced person more than you would pay a new one. But to me, that's an investment in the quality of the employee that we hire. So and and doc we I did discuss it with him if a high dollar claimant came in they do have plans for that right and and and each situation if needed will be evaluated at that time because you're dealing with older people and so as they come into the district they may already come with uh certain underlining conditions and so and it will be treated just like anybody in the district when it comes to underlining conditions. And you know, I'm I'm assuming that we probably will have more of that coming
015in. Maybe, maybe not. We don't know. I mean, we've got people working for us now who have underlining conditions. Well, 20 to 30, 35 years of experience that don't have any underlying issues. You know, I mean, I use me as an example. Well, I got 30 and a2 years and I've been doctor one time this year because of stone. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah. The bottom line is highly qualified certified teachers can only help our students and that's the ultimate goal. Yep. Yep. So, I mean I have no other comments. uh uh am in support of the verbiage that uh have been presented and I'd like to make a motion. Thank you for that, Miss Laws. Motion has been made. I think ready for a vote. Miss Miss Holmes, you good? Okay. Um yeah, so we can
016vote. Uh all in favor? I motion passes unanimously. Okay. Uh, next up, motion to adjurnn. Motion by Miss Law, second by Miss Holmes. Meeting is adjourned. Thank you.