The Edinburgh Town Hall. Daily Journal file photo
With a new police commission and pension boards established, Edinburgh public safety officials are now eligible for better pension benefits.
The Edinburgh Town Council unanimously on Monday approved an ordinance creating the Board of Metropolitan Police Commission and abolishing the office of the town marshall. It will allow the town’s police officers and firefighters to become eligible for the 1977 Police Officers and Firefighters Retirement Fund, or the 1977 Fund, said Dustin Huddleston, town attorney.
Doyne Little, police chief, said the 1977 Fund has better pension benefits and establishes a merit board that disciplinary and other actions would go through. Creating the new police commission is a requirement to opt into the 1977 Fund, he said.
“It’s something that every agency does eventually as they grow and we’re just blessed that the council is working towards giving us a little better of a retirement and to do that, we can’t be a marshals agency — we have to be a police department,” Little previously said.
The 1977 Fund requires employees to contribute 6% of their salary deducted from their paycheck each pay period and employers to pay a contribution rate determined annually by the board of trustees of the Indiana Public Retirement System, or INPRS. Edinburgh police officers are currently in the civilian Public Employees’ Retirement Fund, or PERF, Little said.
Although the office of the town marshal will go away, the town marshal position itself will become the position of police chief, Huddleston said.
The Board of Metropolitan Police Commission will consist of three Edinburgh residents with no more than two members of the same political party. The council will appoint each board member and can amend the ordinance to increase the number of members to five, according to the ordinance.
The board’s role includes appointing people to serve on the Edinburgh Police Department, recommending compensation for police employees and dealing with suspension, demotion and dismissal proceedings. The board can also make general and special rules for the governing and discipline of the police department and make special and general orders of the department through the police chief, according to the ordinance.
The town council can remove a board member for any cause but cannot appoint a police officer employed by Edinburgh to the board and can only appoint one town council member as an ex-officio member on the board.
Board members who are not also members of the town council will receive a salary determined by the council payable monthly out of Edinburgh’s treasury, according to the ordinance.
Each board member’s term would expire the Jan. 1 of the third year after their appointment. The initial terms will be staggered so one member’s term expires each year, which causes two of the members to have a shorter initial term.
The council also approved two ordinances Monday that establish a seven-member police pension board and a three-member fire pension board, alongside the new police commission.
