Counties Address Retiree Health Benefits
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday voted to allocate $17 million toward its unfunded liability for retiree health care benefits, the Los Angeles Daily News reports. The county grand jury last year estimated Los Angeles County's unfunded liability for retiree health care at $9 billion.
Supervisors approved the disbursement from about $238 million in unexpected revenue, largely from property taxes that exceeded county estimates.
A report by the California HealthCare Foundation found that public agencies are not contributing adequate money to fund future retiree health care benefits, noting that some counties, cities and schools could have to reduce services to offset the cost of retiree health benefits (Anderson, Los Angeles Daily News, 9/26).
The Orange County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved contracts with two unions as part of a strategy to address an estimated $1.4 billion deficit in the county retiree medical benefits fund, the Los Angeles Times reports.
Members of the Orange County Managers Association and the Orange County Attorneys Association approved contracts including wage increases of as much as 4.75% and reductions to contributions on retiree health benefits for the unions' 1,500 members. The contract is expected to save the county about $67 million.
The contract agreement is modeled after agreements with other unions that the board approved earlier this month. Overall, the county expects the agreements to reduce the deficit by $815 million (Berthelsen, Los Angeles Times, 9/27).
