The question has been asked and it’s time to let everyone know why deputies never received the enhanced pension benefit that other Milwaukee County Employees received.

Here’s what happened.

Their union President at the time organized a bunch of deputies to oppose the contract that the county was offering. Why? The answer came back that it just wasn’t good enough.

The county had offered everything. Even the backdrop benefit which we know now, but didn’t know then, was more lucrative and unaffordable than was previously thought, was in the package. Deputies would continue to get a 2% multiplier. What that means is this — when a deputy who is with the department at least 5 or 10 years has years of service plus their age that total 75, they can retire. Note: Deputies hired after 1994 have the rule of 85. When they retire, they will get 2% per year of their average salary (calculated over a 3 year period) for the rest of their life. (More senior deputies had a 2.5% multiplier.)

So a deputy hired prior to 1994 who joined the department at age 29 could retire when the were 52 (33 years of service plus age 52 = 75). Their pension would be 33 years x 2% per year, or 66% of their final salary. There is no profit sharing plan in Milwaukee County government.

So what happened? The deputies wanted the enhanced benefit plus another 0.5% added on to their multiplier and they were unconcerned about the starting pay for deputies. That meant that the old timers would be brought up to a whopping 3% had we given them everything they wanted!

That was a deal killer for me when I sat on the Personnel committee.

My previous aide had left to become a deputy. Starting pay was $26,000 per year and took quite a while before it started to rise. Veteran deputies made an impressive salary but all of the perks the union was pushing seemed to be at the expense of the new guys. The Deputy Sheriff’s Association was happy to sit down at the table and offer up the work of their young so it could benefit their old. It completely defied the entire concept of what a union is supposed to do. Union brothers and sisters? As I saw it, that was a twisted brother and sister relationship.

But there was another problem.

After Milwaukee County would go through the expense of training deputies, they would leave to take jobs in other departments — some starting as low as $30,000. So consider what the benefits were to a new deputy. Take a job making less than you could make if you left and if you choose to stay, you know your only assignment will be in the jail as a guard where your life will be in danger and you will be sworn at, spit at and even have feces thrown at you.

Sound like an attractive job?

I didn’t think so. Apparently my Aide didn’t think so either because he left the Sheriff’s Department to take a more lucrative job in law enforcement after less than a year.

So I’ll admit it. I’m the guy. Blame me for pushing for deputies to have a starting salary of $30,000. Yep, I’m the guy who held up the deputy package in the personnel committee and pulled my colleagues along. I’m the guy, who in closed meetings, said that I would never vote for a package for the deputies that had a starting salary of less than $30,000

It could be paid for by saying no to the extra 0.5% in the multiplier. After all, the deputies already got 0.5% more than other county employees so what were these old guys who were in charge of the union whining about?

Well our offer went to the deputies and guess what? They said no. It had everything but the 0.5% and they shot it down. Why? It was because their union President, Geoff Bilda was busy working to kill it. Bilda didn’t think it was a good enough plan for the deputies. Yep, Bilda who had many years in already and wanted a 3% multiplier, didn’t think his 2.5% was enough. Let’s face it, it was a great plan for the deputies because it had enhanced benefits and it wasn’t paid for by screwing the new recruits.

By increasing the starting pay, deputies stopped fleeing their jobs as soon as their training was done. That saved Milwaukee County a lot of money.

It was never our intention to make veteran deputies wealthy but had they approved that contract, many of those old timers who opposed the contract would have gotten the backdrop benefit which got so much publicity. They would have been rewarded handsomely even though those of us on the other side of the table were told by our staff that this was a very affordable benefit and no one would get rich on it.

So you see the irony here?

Interestingly enough, Bilda came to a Judiciary meeting to publicly complain about how Milwaukee County wasn’t negotiating in good faith on the contract and demanded that we get back to the negotiating table. What a mistake that was. You see, I was the Chairman of the Judiciary committee. From the Chairman’s seat I asked him if he was the same Geoff Bilda who worked to kill the County’s offer. Was this the same Geoff Bilda who was pushing for higher pay for senior deputies and lower pay for rookies? Bilda didn’t take too kindly to that but that was really the start of the fall of Geoff Bilda. The next union election saw him tossed out on his ear.

And that’s why deputies don’t have, nor ever did have, the backdrop benefit.