FOP highest priority...support the LEOEA!

[merlin436]

FOP Top Priority Introduced in House of Representatives: “Law Enforcement Officers’ Equity Act”


WASHINGTON, DC - Patrick Yoes, National President of the Fraternal Order of Police, applauded the introduction of H.R. 1323, the “Law Enforcement Officers’ Equity Act,” a top legislative priority for the FOP. This legislation was introduced by Representatives William J. Pascrell, Jr. (D-NJ), Brian K. Fitzpatrick (R-PA), Andrew R. Garbarino (R-NY), and Gerald E. Connolly (D-VA).

“Due to their high level of training and the dangerous nature of the profession, Congress rightfully determined that Federal law enforcement officers should receive enhanced salary and retirement benefits compared to other Federal employees,” explained Yoes. “These enhanced benefits are referred to as 6(c) benefits, but, because of regulatory inconsistencies, nearly 30,000 Federal law enforcement officers do not receive these benefits.”

This legislation would provide all Federal law enforcement officers with 6(c) retirement benefits and the ability to retire after 20 years of service after the age of 50 or after 25 years of service at any age. If enacted, thousands of officers serving in agencies within the U.S. Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs, as well as those employed by the FBI Police, U.S. Postal Service, Federal Protective Service, National Institute of Health, U.S. Mint and the Bureau of Engraving and Printing will receive the same enhanced benefits as their Federal law enforcement counterparts.

"All Federal law enforcement officers put their lives on the line every day, no matter which Federal agency they work for. This bill will ensure that all Federal law enforcement officers receive the same benefits when they retire," said Yoes. “The FOP is grateful to Representatives Pascrell, Fitzpatrick, Garbarino, and Connolly for introducing this legislation, which would expand the definition of ‘law enforcement officer’ for retirement benefits to include all Federal law enforcement officers.”

The Fraternal Order of Police is the largest law enforcement labor organization in the United States with more than 364,000 members.

https://fop.net/2023/03/fop-top-priority-introduced-in-house-of-representatives-law-enforcement-officers-equity-act-2

[merlin436]

Bill text here...

https://pascrell.house.gov/uploadedfiles/pascre_001_xml.pdf

[merlin436]

Contact your Congress folk and let's get this passed.

[Aidokea]

I've never understood why federal cops don't get as much pay and retirement benefits as local cops.

[Sheriff33]

Depends on what part of the country you're in, where I'm at I make double what local LEO's make, and have a pension, hence why I quit being a local LEO lol.

[Aidokea]

There's a patrol officer in Oakland that made $640K in 2019:

https://blog.transparentcalifornia.com/2020/11/16/oakland-cops-640000-pay-package-highest-ever/#:~:text=Oakland%20police%20officer%20Malcolm%20Miller,for%20any%20California%20police%20officer

The best I ever made as a patrol officer was my last year, which was only $250K.

[merlin436]

Many weak unions within the feds as well, it least as it comes to supporting LEO's. Especially the NTEU...which has zero interest in supporting anything LE.

[Levithane]

Aidokea what you're bringing up is a general issue with the General Service Pay Scales. The pay scales regardless of whatever their designation is on the federal side are generally pretty similar. What's happening is the GS scale in a lot of areas isn't keeping up with the cost of living or exceeding it. Increases inevitably have to be approved by congress (obv a slow process). There's an increase every year, but it's being debated whether to allow a 5% to 8% increase across the board, because of all the COL increases. Or they'll have to completely just reevaluate each individual percentage of COL and adjust accordingly (they're finding out another 36% in an area like Houston isn't enough anymore). Local municipalities are able to adjust a bit quicker.

Apartment complexes generally want your yearly income to be 3x whatever the yearly total cost is for rent. With the current rental costs (depending on the area). Depending on the level, General Service Pay isn't meeting the 3x apartment requirement in some cases.

[battlewagon]

The covered LE system is a joke in terms of who gets it. As relatively mundane as 0083 DOD police jobs can be, they are still the real police in their domain and have a decent likelihood of getting into something.

Imagine telling one of those DOD officers, or any other non-covered federal officer they're not rigorous law enforcement by definition, but an Investigator for the Federal Elections Commission OIG or an 1811 with Export Import Bank OIG is.

Hopefully this gets some traction. Something similar seems to be introduced every year, but never goes the distance.

[Captain Max]

VA Police Officer Horst Woods was shot and killed and his name engraved on 'the wall' in DC, yet OPM didn't consider him law enforcement. Perps who assault VA officers are charged with AFO under Title 18, but OPM maintains that they are not law enforcement.

[57IG]

The issue is the mandatory retirement age. Should this be removed and/or increased. If you have XYZ LE positions available all covered by mandatory retirement will you have bodies and experience to fill them.

[Captain Max]

Then we'll have to stop paying people not to work!

[orlandofed5-0]

This bill has been paraded in various forms for the last 25 years and generally gets killed every year without moving out of committee. Lots of agencies really don't want it because they would no longer be able to hire retirees from the military and local police agencies without going through the arduous task of getting age waivers. Personally I think it would be easier to just do away with the being under 37 or 40 for retirement purposes and just go to a 20-25 and out for public safety positions within the federal government.

[Captain Max]

Agencies don't want it because they'd rather spend the money on new carpeting.

[battlewagon]

This bill has been paraded in various forms for the last 25 years and generally gets killed every year without moving out of committee. Lots of agencies really don't want it because they would no longer be able to hire retirees from the military and local police agencies without going through the arduous task of getting age waivers. Personally I think it would be easier to just do away with the being under 37 or 40 for retirement purposes and just go to a 20-25 and out for public safety positions within the federal government.

My counterpoint to this would be veterans are age exempt anyways from the covered hiring age under the Isabella decision and it has been this way for a while now (we had a Marine in my USBP class that was well into his 40s with no prior 6c/12d time), and how many 38-45 year old LEOs for state, county, and local entities are really out there applying to start a new career, start their retirement over, etc?

That isn't a loaded question, I know one personally who would jump but he's 39. But nothing is free in this world, have to give something up to gain something. And giving all FLEOs equitable retirement and benefits is much heavier on the scale against the ability to hire 42 year olds into those uncovered positions. Which is of course just my opinion.

[orlandofed5-0]

But how many agencies are willing to do the waiver is pretty small. Unless the agency gets sued and the courts enforce the provisions of the Veterans preference code, agencies will do what they want.

Lots of retired guys, especially from the local agencies do apply for 0083 positions. These are the guys who tend to come over looking at a decent paycheck and some benefits, particularly in areas where the 0083's are making more than the local officers. Unfortunately they also look at the federal retirement as nothing more than a supplement to their state retirement.

Getting rid of the upper tier age for retirement and putting these persons into a 20 year retirement will do the following:

1. Create a system where both older and younger officers stay for the duration of their careers. Right now the 0083 system has one of the highest turnover rates of all federal law enforcement.

2. Pay... Putting all 0083's under a pay plan that's decent and doesn't require individual management to sign off would also keep folks. Special salary rates have been a boon in areas where the cost of living is through the roof.

[wildstar82]

Another bill on the table is the Law Enforcement Officer Fair Retirement Act, which would count overtime hours toward retirement benefits, specifically for federal law enforcement officers.

This would be huge and would allow a lot of uniformed Fed LE to boost their retirement commensurate with the hours they put in at work. It would help Fed LE close the gap with the much larger state retirements detailed by other state/local retirees on this board

https://pascrell.house.gov/uploadedfiles/pascre_003_xml.pdf

[Captain Max]

I read the law and it already says that federal law enforcement get the coverage. Trouble is, OPM took it upon themselves quite illegally to pick and choose who gets it. I remember a court case in the late '90's challenging that, but LE lost.

It would also benefit for training to be standardized. I know the VA doesn't want that now because they don't want officers acting like cops and arresting doctors and nurses when they get stupid. The result is the useless VA Police academy when FLETC is the cheaper alternative.

[battlewagon]

I read the law and it already says that federal law enforcement get the coverage. Trouble is, OPM took it upon themselves quite illegally to pick and choose who gets it. I remember a court case in the late '90's challenging that, but LE lost.

It would also benefit for training to be standardized. I know the VA doesn't want that now because they don't want officers acting like cops and arresting doctors and nurses when they get stupid. The result is the useless VA Police academy when FLETC is the cheaper alternative.

You are correct, there was Hobbs v. Office of Personnel Management, 58 M.S.P.R. 628 (1993) and then a shift in determining definitions with Watson v. Department of the Navy, 86 M.S.P.R. 318 (2000).

A technical point getting away from the thread 's intent that people should understand in general is that these non-covered LEOs, while not meeting certain definitions of OPM to get the enhanced covered LEO retirement, are still federal LEOs through and through, with federal arrest authority and other privileges.

NOAA 0083 police recently got covered through efforts by their own agency, and even better, received retroactive credit for the uncovered time they had already served. It should be universal across the federal government, which this bill aims to change, but until then, the agencies are the ones who are doing their officers a disservice.

[Captain Max]

'Certain definitions' which are not in the law.

[battlewagon]

I'm just making the point for people who may be reading this and confused or new to the federal world that they are federal law enforcement in the way that means more, as in they are law enforcement through and through. It says so on their creds and in whatever statute in whatever title code.

The certain definitions part is an OPM thing which has nothing to do with their status as law enforcing LEOs, but everything to do with their pension and retirement, unfortunately.

Just clarifying for people who are new to this world or browsing for job info and come across this, so they don't walk away thinking that the non-covered jobs we are talking about (VA police, DOD police, Mint, etc) aren't actual law enforcement, as in they can't make arrests, etc.

[Levithane]

The issue is the mandatory retirement age. Should this be removed and/or increased. If you have XYZ LE positions available all covered by mandatory retirement will you have bodies and experience to fill them.

What they should do is waive the retirement age or lengthen it, if you have federal service in any federal job (similar to how they waive the age restriction or lengthen it for military veterans). Part of the reason there is a mandatory retirement age is obviously with age the belief is the ability to do the job goes down, the other part is you need to be able to work enough years to be able to have a stable retirement. As far as I know all the federal jobs are under the same retirement system, and invest in retirement the same way Federal LEO positions do. The main difference is the LEO positions get an increase amount of money in the retirement plan for the pension. If you're in a federal position already you're more or less contributing to the same retirement plans, you just aren't getting the enhanced portion LEO positions get.

There's a few agencies that have increased the age you can apply, provided you're in another position (even if it is just an admin position). The FBI does this. If you are an intel analyst or one of the other positions IIRC the age gets raised to 40 years old to let internal employees apply for SA positions.

[Captain Max]

LEO's contribute more as well. If you leave the system for a non-6(c) job, you just gave away money. I knew a few guys who did that and I told them they'll never get that money back but they didn't care.

[Levithane]

Captain Max

Im not well versed on the contribution amounts. Just as general information the pensions are calculated something like your high 3 years of your salary in your pay grade X your creditable service years X 1.1%. The Leo calculation is your high 3 years salary X creditable service years X 1.7% plus your high 3 years of your salary in your pay grade X your creditable service years X1.1%. Being in federal service LEOs and federal employees contribute to TSP. Then the final part is getting social security.

Point I was making is if you're in federal service already, not in a leo position, contributing to TSP and earning your time. Agencies should just waive or lengthen the age cut off, since the person is already in federal service in some capacity.