Pam Childers tells Escambia County Commission she will halt retirement payments in January

Escambia County Clerk of Court and Comptroller Pam Childers sent a letter to the County Commission on Friday stating that in January, she would end all contribution payments for the three commissioners enrolled in a controversial retirement program.

If Childers follows through and ends the payments next month, it will all but assure the two constitutional county offices will go to court against each other over the program.

The controversy has been roiling county politics since the summer when Commissioner Steven Barry proposed an up to $1.9 million backpay settlement for commissioners and senior staff who were unaware of the county's 401(a) retirement program as an alternative to the Florida Retirement System.

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The settlement plan was scrapped after public pushback, but Childers argued the entire annuity program was not allowed under Florida law because of its lucrative benefits for elected officials.

As comptroller, Childers controls the county's checkbook and under Florida law can be held personally liable if she issues a payment that is not legal.

In her letter Friday, Childers said she and her attorney had reviewed the county's position laid out in a letter from attorney Troy Rafferty with the Levin Papantonio Rafferty law firm, who is representing the county on the issue.

"I do not find your attorney's assertions to be meritorious," Childers wrote.

Childers said as of the first payday in January, Commissioners Barry, Lumon May and Robert Bender will stop receiving any contribution from the county into their 401(a) account.

Commission Chairman Jeff Bergosh told the News Journal that Childers hand-delivered the letter to his office Friday morning.

Bergosh, who does not participate in the annuity program, said any response to the letter would be handled by the county's attorneys.

The county has had the annuity program for commissioners and senior-level staff since 1997, but before 2018, only one former commissioner and a handful of directors had participated in the program.

The county's contract with ICMA, the company that manages the program for the county, states that it will use the same contribution rates as the Florida Retirement System.

However, the rate the county pays into FRS and what winds up in a commissioner's retirement account is vastly different.

The liabilities of the FRS pension programs require counties to contribute far more than an individual sees deposited into their retirement account.

Using the same contribution rates FRS requires from the county for the annuity program results in commissioners receiving a contribution equal to 51.42% of their salary under the current rates, which equates to $44,053 annually.

Under the normal FRS system, the county still pays the full $44,053 to the FRS, but each commissioner would receive a contribution amount of only 8.95% of their salary, about $7,668, into their individual FRS retirement account, with 8.34% attributed to the county's contribution.

In July, Childers unilaterally lowered the contribution rate to 8.34% for commissioners, which is an annual contribution amount of $7,145, a move that kicked off the growing tension between her office and the commission.

In September, Rafferty sent Childers' attorney a letter laying out the county's position for why the payments were legal.

While the two sides disagree on at least three legal points, the major issue of contention appears to boil down to how a Florida law that allows counties to set up annuity retirement programs outside FRS is being interpreted.

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Rafferty said Childers' reading of the law was incorrect.

"She cites irrelevant parts of that law which authorize local governments to 'purchase retirement annuities … for county personnel 50 years of age or older with 25 or more years of creditable service.'" Raffery wrote. "That has nothing to do with the other part of the statute — which expressly authorizes supplemental retirement programs for county personnel."

In her letter Friday, Childers said her position hasn't changed and the county cannot take one sentence of the law out of context to make its program legal.

"… Taking one sentence from Florida Statute Section 121.182 and considering it in a vacuum without the context of the entire statute is misguided," Childers wrote.

Jim Little can be reached at jwlittle@pnj.com and 850-208-9827.

This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Escambia annuity program: Pam Childers to stop payments in January