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INFORMAL REPORT To CITE' COUNCIL MEMBERS Na, 8.2
To the Mayor and Memr tiers of the City Council Date: 06/06/04
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Page 1 of 3
`U JECT' IMPLEMENTATION STATUi S of MILITARY LEAVE BAN
AND OTHER BENEFITS RECENTLY ADDED TO CHAPTER
143 OF THE MUN! ICIP AFL CODE
request was made by a Council Member for information on the implementation of the provisions of
H.B. 400 that was passed in the last legislative session. H.B. 2400 added two provisions to the Civil.
Service lave known as Chapter 143. Chapter 143 applies to only sworn Police Officer's and Fire Fighters
employed by the City of Fort Worth.
SUNEVIAH OF'H,B, 2400 CONTENTS
H.B. 2400 was passed at the end of the 2003 Texas Legislative session as an amendment to another bill..
This s piece of legislation requires the addition of two segments to Section 143.072, MILITARY ARY LEAVE
OF ABSENCE. it also adds a new section to Chapter 143 as 143.075, MILITARY LEAVE TIME
ACCOUNTS.
Section 1.43.072 (g)provides that a city must continue to maintain any health., dental or life insurance for
the called up reservist until such time as the individual asks the City to discontinue such coverage.
Section 143.072 (h) provides for a fire fighter or police officer to voluntarily substitute for an individual
called to active military service if the service is expected to last for one year or more.
The new Section 1.43.0 '5, MILITARY LEAVE TBE ACCOUNT'S provides for the establishment of
separate leave banks in the police and fire Departments for individuals who are called up for active
rnuilitaary service. To access the leave bank, a police officer or fire fighter roust have served at least one
year of continuous duty in the military service, and have exhausted their vacation, holiday and
compensatory leave. The bank is supplied by.the, donation of any amount of vacation,, holiday,
compensatory or sick leave from other sworn individuals in the respective department. The leave time is
credited and debited on an hourly basis regardless of the cash value of the leave. Individuals who apply to
make use oft is leave bare will receive pay on the basis of salary continuation. They will receive t heir
City pay in addition to their military pay to the degree that the number of hours in the bank allows it. The
law requires the City to distribute the donated leave equally among all eli; ible participants.
ISSUES WrrH MiTERPRET TIO
The City had several issues with the language of this bill. The language was vague or silent on some
aspects which could result in nmisinterpretation or incorrect application of the law. To clarify these issues
before the law was implemented,, the Department of Law requested an AG"s opinion through a legislator
on two issues.
The first question was on Section 143.072 (g). It was not clear if the intent was for the City to pay the full
f amount of the individual's,;health, dental or life insurance or if the employee was expected to continue to
pay his/her share. The .G's opinion was that the law did not require any additional cost to,the City than
ISSUED BY THE CITE"' MANAGER FORT WORTH. TEXAS,
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INFORMAL REPORT TO CITY COUNCIL MEMBERS NO. 8602
PATIO To the Mayor and Members of the City Council Date: 06/08/04
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Page 3 of 3
SUBJECT: IMPLEMENTATION ENTATIO STATUS OF MILITARY LEAVE BANK
AND OTHER BENEFITS RECENTLY ADDED, TO CHAPTER
143 OF THE: MUNICIPAL GOOD
Agreement"' nor the "Exchange of Time" procedure, they agreed that they would utilize the procedures,
forms and tracking,mechanisms utilized by the Fire Department to establish and monitor the litany
leave bad:and substitution of time.
:neither the Fire nor the Police ee Departments anticipate significant problems with the administration of this
new law as it is not likely to impact a larger umber of personnel.
RE G ISSUES
While the dmin strati n oft is new law may not prove difficult, there still remain several issues o
concern.,
There appears to be no mechanism for the termination of the military leave bank if there is no neea for it
t some future point
in time. The city may be required to maintain it forever.
;,. T hemanner in whir ch the time in the military leave band is distributed also may rov problematic. The
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law states if there are insufficient funds in the account to meet all the requests, the remaining funds should
be distributed equally, but how this is done when there are requests for its use at if�"erent tunes and when
of
there may be variable amounts time in the bank may rove difficult. This potentially could result It n
complaints of unfairness.
While at the current time the military,leave bank may not have a significant cost to the City there is the
potential for sig1lificant, amounts of unfunded liability for the City f at some future time large numbers of
reservists are called up for longer periods of time. This would be especially true '.f"the leave that was
donated to the bank was from sick leave accruals. Both police and fare fighters are paid for only up to 9
days of accrued sick leave. If only sick leave above the 90 days is donated and used then the City will
potentially assume a large unfunded liability. The same issue could arise in the Police Department if
police officers donate only vacation time that they are likely to lose at the end of the year. This time leas
impact w w r �w �h wr • ► r
no budgetary mpact.in the current year as zt w s included n tl e budget, but if it is used by an *Individual
from the military leave bank, this would become an unfunded liability.
a W ael"
City Manager
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ISSUED Y THE CITY MANAGER FORT WORTH,. TEXAS,