AURORA | As Aurora City Council members contemplate officially signing off on a ballot question that would ask voters to increase elected officials’ pay this fall, nearly two dozen former city politicos and their spouses continue to net as much as $2,089 a month in retirement benefits, according to documents procured through an open records request and obtained by The Aurora Sentinel.
There are 23 retired elected officials from Aurora currently receiving monthly benefits, with totals ranging from former mayor Paul Tauer, who nets $2,089.56 each month, to a beneficiary of former official Nancy Crawford, who earns a $92.28 benefit check each month. The average monthly total is $664.94.
Questions regarding benefits afforded to council members have been sporadically raised in recent weeks, including at the April 3 regular council meeting where Duane Senn, head of a local neighborhood association, chastised the 11 officials on the upper council dais for failing to reveal the benefits when discussing the proposed ballot question.
“Aurora’s elected officials have granted themselves a generous retirement package,” Senn, who ran for council himself in 2007, said at the recent meeting. “The elected officials do not contribute to the program that grants them a nice retirement check.”
Benefits offered to Aurora’s former elected officials vary based on an array of stipulations, including years of service, when that service occurred and age. Retired city politicians who have served in the past 18 years are generally eligible for $76.88 per month for each year they served — for a maximum of 12 years — and a $244.44 “supplemental benefit,” according to city documents. Upon an elected official’s death, their spouse is generally eligible to continue receiving all of the benefits.
Following the passage of a council-approved rule several years ago, council members elected before Nov. 5, 2013 can first draw their checks at age 56 or after six years in office, while members elected after that date can grab their benefits after they turn 62 or serve for six years, according to city documents.
If retired council members receiving benefits are re-elected in the city, the dollars are halted until their new term expires, according to Dan Quillen, the city’s director of internal services.
Executive city staff, including the city manager’s staff, department directors and most legal workers hired before 1998, can earn benefits that roughly mirror those offered to elected officials, as well as a retirement savings program through which the city will match contributions. Executives in the program pay 7 percent of their earnings, which the city will match, according to a city ordinance passed in 1996. Nearly two dozen former executive staffers receive monthly retirement benefits.
All city employees, including council members, are also eligible for health coverage after they retire, according to Quillen. He said the most popular plan is a Kaiser DHMO, which costs $1,575.82 per month for a family if the employee is under 65 years old, according to the city’s current retiree rate schedule. The same plan for two seniors on Medicare is $472.34 per month.
The city pays more than $1,000 per month in insurance contributions for the mayor and three council members: Marsha Berzins, Renie Peterson and Charlie Richardson, according to a city response to a records request Senn filed earlier this year. Monthly insurance payments on behalf of other council members range from $7.80 for Francoise Bergan to $581.45 each for Barb Cleland and Bob LeGare.
Council members voted 6-4 April 3 to initially approve an ordinance that would ask voters to grant the city’s elected officials a roughly 33-percent pay bump for the first time in nearly 25 years.
Currently, council members earn $13,950, the mayor makes $60,226 and the mayor pro tem nets $15,953. The ballot question could ask voters to bump those totals to $18,550, $80,000 and $20,550, respectively.
Council members are also granted about $1,100 for certain monthly expenses and $7,000 each in annual travel expenses. The mayor is permitted $11,000 for travel expenses, according to council rules.
Hogan led all council members in travel expenses last year with a total of $11,976.04 spent on nearly a dozen trips, according to documents the city produced after Senn filed an open records request. Carryover funds from 2015 made up for the nearly $1,000 extra Hogan spent on travel last year.
The ordinance calling for the ballot question still needs to receive final approval from council members during a second reading at a future meeting.