Pension-fund liability forces Boynton Beach to call off merger talks with PBSO
Pension-fund liability forces Boynton to call off merger talks with PBSO
Boynton Beach is keeping its police department.
The city commission called off its pursuit of a possible merger with the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office on Tuesday. Mayor Ty Penserga announced that the city's police pension fund contributions — running into the millions annually and continuing for nearly another decade — made a potential merger "financially unfeasible."
Sheriff Ric Bradshaw beat the city to its own announcement. On Monday, Bradshaw released a statement that said Boynton Beach was backing out of a possible deal because of those pension fund liabilities. It took city officials more than 30 hours to address the situation.
The issue appears to be the $7 million annual pension fund contribution that is the city's responsibility for another seven or eight years, according to Penserga.
Discussions between the city and PBSO have been on-going since April so why it took until mid-August to discover the problem is unknown.
The flirtation with PBSO won't go down as this city commission's best moment, but to the overwhelming number of residents who publicly opposed a deal with PBSO, it was good news.
Bonus info for reading this newsletter: The city commission has settled on three candidates for a permanent city manager. Among that group is Jim Stables, who has been serving in an interim capacity since Lori LaVerriere was fired April 19.
The other finalists are Boynton police Capt. Dan Dugger and Robert Curnow, the deputy city manager in Coral Springs. Dugger was named on four of the five commissioner ballots even though he has no experience in the city manager's office.
I will have a story on this in the coming days. Thanks for being a subscriber. Have a great week.
Jorge Milian
South Palm Beach County reporter | The Palm Beach Post
Twitter: @caneswatch
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Post on Boynton Beach weekly newsletter
