Below this Guarino post on Greensboro Police Chief Tim Bellamy’s pending retirement, regular commenter ‘Stormy’ asks a few questions about the city’s pension plan:
Many government employees have defined benefit plans based upon years of service and age which produces a multiplier times the employee’s final salary on retirement. Under plans such as this, you often see employees promoted to positions beyond their competence in the last few years of employment to optimize the employee’s pension.
If the city’s plan works in this manner, could it be that Bellamy was named chief, and given a raise, with the idea that he would retire in a few years, optimizing his retirement? If so, then this may have been the reason why Bellamy was “given” this job for a few years, knowing he would be replaced later.
OK, I don’t know how the city’s pension plan works, but I’ll go out on a limb and guess it’s not a bad deal. Which is why I’m still mystified about Bellamy’s controversial comment that his decision to retire was based on Bill Knight’s election as mayor.
Exactly how does Bellamy expect us to react to such a statement? Are we supposed to feel sorry for him? Are we supposed to beg him not to retire? The guy’s retiring at age 51 —-something the majority of us in the private sector aren’t able to do —- with both a pension and many earning years left ahead of him.
I somehow think Chief Bellamy’s gonna be alright.
