AASD has and is in the process of making some changes recently that effect AASD employees post-retirement benefits. These changes were discussed during the 01/09/2023 Appleton Area School District Board of Education meeting, although nothing was voted on at that time.
One item reported to the Board was to no longer allow retirees 65 and older to continue on the District’s health insurance plan at their own expense beyond the legally required COBRA period. This would only apply to retirees from 2023 an onward. Those retirees 65 and older who are already on the District’s plan would be able to remain on it at their own expense.
This would be a change in practice but did not require change to the handbook language, so it was brought forward as an information item and my impression was that it did not require approval by the Board.
The change was prompted by the fact that AASD now has a self-funded insurance plan which means that although the retirees pay the full amount of their premium, the district would still have to pay for any claims which could have a real impact on the District’s budget.
Board member Kris Sauter asked if this change would be a concern to 2023 retirees. Human Resources Officer Julie King did not know, particularly given that retirees over 65 currently purchasing the District plan would not be kicked off.
Additionally, it was difficult to gauge how many people would be affected because, although 35-40 educators and an equal number of non-educator employees, retired every year, not all of those employees were 65 or older. Many AASD staff members retired anywhere between 55 and 58 and would still be able to purchase District insurance. A much smaller number retired around the age of 65 and an unknown number opted to continue on the district’s plan.
Ms. King noted that there were often less expensive options available but some people liked the familiarity of the District’s plan. The District was going to provide information to retirees about the Medicare plans available to them. [Honestly, if you’re a 65-year-old AASD retiree needing to purchase insurance, your best bet would be to just contact an independent insurance agent to go over your available options.]
The second change brought to the Board was a request to revise the employee handbook so that educators would only be eligible to receive post-employment benefits if they submitted a retirement letter by February 15 for the end of the school year, rather than also having the option to submit a letter by October 20 for retirement at the end of the 1st semester. This was brought to the Board as an information item and would come back on 01/23/2023 as an action item.
This change is prompted by a growing number of 1st semester retirements and an increasing difficulty in finding qualified candidates to start at the beginning of the second semester. Per Ms. King, “This really results in an inability to secure a quality candidate at that time of the school year, thus disrupting the students’ academic experience. Therefore, the recommendation would be to allow only retirements at the end of the school year with the post retirement benefit.”
Kris Sauter was concerned that this would negatively impact individuals who found themselves in poor health after the deadline to submit a resignation letter had already passed. Ms. King said that, even in the past, they had experienced such cases and they had handled those on a case-by-case basis.
Board member Ed Ruffolo asked if staff was aware of these changes or had an opportunity to provide feedback. It sounded like there had not because Ms. King indicated the opportunity for feedback would happen at an upcoming post-retirement benefit meeting. She also noted that these changes would apply to people wanting to retire at the semester of the 2023-24 school year.
Kris asked if they knew whether individuals who retired at the semester were people who had been planning to retire at the end of the previous school year but then gave the district an extra semester or if they were people who initially planned to retire at the end of the year and then decided to leave a semester early.
Ms. King did not have a sense regarding that. She did stress that over the last 8 years, 73% of semester retirements (11 out of 15) had taken place in the past three years which had been AASD’s most challenging time to recruit candidates. They were seeing an increase in semester retirements.
She also pointed out that AASD’s practice in this respect was uncommon. In fact, they used to allow quarterly retirements and then changed that to only semester retirements for much the same reasons they were now wanting to end semester retirements.
One final employee benefit related item was not brought up by staff or Board members but rather by a member of the public during the public hearing portion of the meeting.
Daniel’s wife was an AASD educator. He came to voice his concerns about the District’s sick leave policy. His wife currently had over 900 hours of accrued sick leave, and when she had first joined the District, accrued sick leave was something that could be transferred to a balance on retirement and used to pay for health insurance post-retirement. Unfortunately, that was no longer something AASD did.
He was concerned that simply having accrued sick-leave disappear upon retirement incentivized employees to use it up at a time when the District’s focus was on having teacher be at school every day engaged with their students.
He mentioned that Superintendent Greg Hartjes had told his wife that the leadership team was working on the sick leave policy, and he encouraged the Board to update the policy. He thought doing so would help tremendously with recruitment.
I’ve prepared a transcript of the public comment and discussion about the two employee benefit items for your downloading pleasure.
View full meeting details here: http://go.boarddocs.com/wi/aasd/Board.nsf/goto?open&id=CLNMKU5BAC9B
View full meeting video here: https://youtu.be/uQ-G6IFYWAo
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