Rep. David Clark, R-Santa Clara, gets the Utah Taxpayer Association's 2005 Taxpayer Advocate of the Year award for sponsoring House Bill 213, which ends a policy that allowed state workers to trade unused sick leave for post-retirement medical benefits.

"At the end of the day," Clark said Monday, "it's the taxpayers who ultimately pay the bill."

But union representatives of public employees say the award is a second slap in state workers' faces.

"They're rubbing our face in the dirt," said Audry Wood, Utah Public Employees Association director. "The bill was bad enough. But then to give him an award for running the bill is ridiculous."

House Bill 213 cuts off a retirement benefit state workers were offered in exchange for lower salaries and few pay raises in the 1980s. Employees can now trade eight hours of accumulated sick leave for one month of medical insurance coverage. But starting Jan. 1, 2006, state workers will be required to deposit one-fourth of their sick leave into a 401(k) account and the rest can be traded, but at a reduced rate. Some workers have complained they will lose years of post-retirement medical benefits.

Taxpayers Association Vice President Mike Jerman says Clark's legislation is fair to state employees. The business-funded association concludes state taxpayers are virtually guaranteed to save money with the new retirement policy because it eventually releases the state from some of the burden of paying increasingly expensive medical benefits for state retirees.

"Even after the change, the benefit is very generous," Jerman said. "It's fair and appropriate for taxpayers and state employees. It's the right thing to do."

Wood, however, says the taxpayer award is questionable because state number crunchers still haven't figured out how much HB213 will save taxpayers. An actuary has been hired to calculate the financial impact of the legislation.

"It's ridiculous for the Taxpayers Association to give an award out to a legislator for a benefit that nobody knows the costs of," Wood said. "It's a little premature to be giving anyone an award."

But Clark points to wide-ranging estimates of the cost of continuing the retirement program - between $250 million and $500 million in the next few decades - that he quoted during the legislative session as justification for the change in policy.

"The benefit was a good idea in the beginning. But it's something we can't afford," Clark said. "I'm truly sorry that HB213 was required. I wish there was a better way to do this. But there is not."