BONANZA FOR OLD COPS PENSION HIKE NOT WORKING AS RETIREMENT-DELAY PLOY.

Byline: Beth Barrett and Harrison Sheppard  Staff Writers

A pension-boosting measure approved by voters in June to retain senior Los Angeles police officers has backfired and instead led to a massive exodus of some of the department's most experienced staff.

Sixty-eight veteran LAPD officers retired this month - more than seven times the number who retired in January 2001 and more than double the average of the past three Januarys.

Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, said the city gave the police officers ``an incentive to bail'' with the new pension system, which allows those with 33 years' service to get pension benefits equal to 90 percent of their last year's average monthly salary.

``It's unbelievable,'' Coupal said. ``Now they get to cash out at virtually their full pay and go to work at another police agency, or another job. They should never have given them the incentive to leave in the first place.''

City Councilwoman Cindy Miscikowski, chairwoman of the Public Safety Committee and among those who signed arguments in favor of the pension charter amendment in June, said she was not concerned with the surge in retirements - providing it is not a long-term trend.

``One month is not something to overly react to,'' Miscikowski said, noting that the LAPD reported surpassing its expectations this year for stemming overall attrition.

``No one from inside the system has sounded the alarm.''

The force has dipped to 8,910 - 191 fewer sworn officers than last year about this time, according to LAPD officials - while crime increases throughout the city and hundreds of officers have been reassigned to security duties in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Cmdr. George Ibarra, head of the LAPD's personnel group, said the retirements were driven largely by economics.

Officers had waited until Jan. 1, 2002, for the new system approved by voters in June to take effect. Some seasoned officers - including west San Fernando Valley Councilman Dennis Zine - took advantage of the change, which allowed them to get $15,000 or so more a year in pension benefits.

``A lot is financial,'' Ibarra said, noting that officers who already were contemplating retirement were likely to wait until the new year to enter the system.

Voters were told passage of the pension package was crucial to keep cops on the job longer.

The ballot argument stated: ``We need to keep our skilled firefighters and police officers on the job, but under the current pension system, many of our best men and women in uniform have a financial incentive to retire early.''

Still, pension and other city officials now say they are not surprised by the spike in retirements.

``I'm not overly surprised based on the low number of (retirement) applications from the year before,'' said Ed Griffiths, Fire and Police Pensions assistant general manager. ``There was this dammed-up demand for retirement.''

Available historical information for combined police and fire retirement applications for January 2001 indicates 10 left; for January 2000, 23; and for January 1999, 43.

This January, the combined police and fire retirements through the beginning of this week totaled 79, with pension officers saying more applicants are streaming into their offices each day.

City Controller Laura Chick, who supported the measure, said it was never intended as a short-term, ``stop-gap measure,'' but rather as one of many tools to help recruit and retain officers.

Chick said she envisioned the new pension package as a ``long-term incentive'' that would encourage officers to stay with the LAPD, confident there would be advantages at retirement.

``I never believed making the retirement benefit more attractive would solve the problem immediately or in and of itself. The causes are complicated and many as to why we're losing officers. There is not a simple or singular cause.''

Mitzi Grasso, president of the Los Angeles Police Protective League, which has waged a bitter fight to oust Chief Bernard C. Parks, said seasoned officers are so fed up with the LAPD that they are leaving at the first possible opportunity under the new pension plan rather than staying on to provide leadership as politicians had hoped.

Younger officers, she said, have adopted a wait-and-see attitude.

``People are going to leave as long as Parks is chief of police, that's it,'' Grasso said. ``Crime is up, morale is down; they don't feel they can do their job, that they're handcuffed. They're leaving out of frustration.''

LAPD officials disputed the union's assessment, with Ibarra noting that the number of resignations, including defections to other departments, has dropped from 255 in the 12 months ending in June 2001 to just 67 in the six months prior to January.

``That's the huge blip,'' Ibarra said. ``Officers are out there shopping, and now the LAPD is competitive.''

Ibarra said it is now a matter of hiring more officers to begin filling up to 1,300 open LAPD positions.

``There's no question we're losing fewer officers,'' he said.

The department lost 136 officers to retirements, resignations and firings from July 1, 2001, to Jan. 13, 2002, Ibarra told the council's Public Safety Committee on Monday - less than half the rate the department was averaging in the previous three years. The department's loss had been 658 officers per year - or roughly 329 in six months.

``With over half the fiscal year gone, we're on pace for about 300'' for the full year, said Capt. Richard Webb of the Recruitment Employment Division.

Also, police officials said there has been an increase in the number of former LAPD officers who left to work in other cities and who are now looking to return to the department. The process currently takes at least six months, officials said, but they are looking for ways to streamline the process to less than half the current time.

In addition, the city is starting a program to return as many as 150 retired officers to active duty for up to 90 days to help out with administrative duties, allowing younger officers to go back on the streets.

Griffiths, the pensions official, said the effectiveness of the new program won't really be known for months as cops weigh the financial advantages of staying on three more years, boosting their pension from 81 percent to 90 percent of their last year's average monthly salary.

``The intent was to at least get another three years of service out of the employees,'' Griffiths said. ``But retirement is an individual choice, and there are a lot of factors.''

All of the officers who retired this month had 20 or more years on the force, though 53 officers had not reached the 33 years required for maximum pension benefits, according to Department of Fire and Police Pensions officials.

Under the new pension plan, officers with 20 years in the LAPD who are at least 50 years old can retire with a pension that's 50 percent of their last year's average monthly salary, compared with 40 percent for officers with 20 years under the old plan.

After 30 years, officers under the new pension plan continue to get 3 percent more a year, until they top out at 33 years with 90 percent of their last year's average monthly salary. No such incentive was available in the past, when officers topped out at 70 percent of their last salary at 30 years.

This fiscal year, the city contributed $100.3 million to the pension fund, down from $136.2 million last fiscal year, pension officials said. Members also contribute to the fund.

The new pension plan gives officers more money up front, but pension officials say cost-of-living factors could make it comparable to the old system over time.

Another voter-approved enhancement plan is to take effect in May. Called the Deferred Retirement Option Program, cops could work up to five years while their pension is put aside in an interest-bearing account.

``Some (officers) are sticking around to see how that pans out,'' Ibarra said.

Police recruiters said they are optimistic that hiring will pick up, pointing to more people taking the qualifying written test and larger Police Academy classes.

``Slowly but surely we're seeing it (growth) in academy classes,'' said Scott DeYoung, chief personnel analyst in the Personnel Department's Public Safety Bureau, noting that the number of people taking the written test has fluctuated between about 600 and 1,800 people a month since September.