This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
I wrote in Friday's column about a pending crisis in Utah law enforcement, caused partially by the Utah Legislature's action six years ago that reduces police retirement benefits and makes it less attractive to be a cop.
That and other factors contributed to a dramatic decrease in the number of applicants for job openings in police and sheriff's departments and led to 50 percent of hires quitting for other careers within six years.
Well, there currently are efforts by some legislators to alleviate the pressure on law enforcement by making adjustments to return some benefits to cops and firefighters. But those efforts in the last legislative session were squashed by the Republican super-majority.
As I noted Friday, the Legislature passed a retirement system reform bill in 2010 to avoid draconian budget responsibilities in the future by placing more of the retirement investment responsibility on the employee.
Part of the bill reduced benefits for public safety employees — raising the retirement eligibility from 20 years to 25 years and reducing the retirement pay from 50 percent of retirees salary, calculated by the average of his or her three highest paid years, to 37 percent of that average salary.
That, along with low pay and increased scrutiny from the public and lawmakers, has made it less attractive to be a cop, according to the number of applicants to law enforcement agencies compared to past years.
Where an advertisement for 20 to 30 openings would attract up to 1,000 applicants a few years ago, that ad will garner less than 100 today, law enforcement officials told me.
And, a Utah League of Cities Towns study last summer found that 50 percent of new recruits to police agencies will quit for other lines of work within six years of their hire date.
To address the issue some in law enforcement are calling a crisis, two lawmakers became impassioned to fix the problem, or at least slow down the bleeding.
Sen. Karen Mayne, D-West Valley City, and Rep. Rich Cunningham, R-South Jordan, introduced bills in the Senate and House, respectively, that would allow a retired cop or firefighter to seamlessly reapply to another government agency on the retirement program and work there for salary while collecting his or her retirement pay from the previous job.
Mayne's bill, which would reduce the waiting period after retirement before applying for another job from one year to 60 days, passed the Senate Retirement and Independent Entities Committee but failed in the full Senate by a 10-17 vote.
Four of the five Democrats in the Senate voted for the bill, with the fifth absent for the vote. Only six of the 29 Republicans voted for it.
Critics claimed it would be unfair to make certain exceptions for some government jobs and not for others.
But proponents pointed out the bill made it easier for cops, once retired from one agency, to hire on at a rural police or sheriff's department, since those agencies find it particularly hard to find recruits.
Salt Lake City Police Chief Mike Brown said the larger agencies, like his, can recruit veteran officers from other departments by the lateral promotion rule. That means they can hire cops from other cities or towns and let them maintain their seniority while being able to offer up to $10 more per hour in wages.
That handicaps the rural agencies that can't pay close to what the larger city agencies can pay, hence Mayne's bill to alleviate the pain of working for a lower-paying rural department.
Cunningham had several bills in the House that were similar to Mayne's but also added similar benefits for public school teachers — again in an attempt to make going to rural schools more attractive.
Cunningham's bills couldn't even get past the committees for a vote on the House floor.
Mayne says she will resume the fight in the Senate next year, "because I am passionate about this." But Cunningham won't be around for the next battle. He chose to not run for re-election to his House seat in favor of running for the state Senate. But he was defeated in the Republican primary by incumbent Lincoln Fillmore.
Meanwhile, expect the gene pool of law enforcement recruits to continue to dwindle.