(STURGIS) - The City of Sturgis is looking at a program that would keep employees who may not be quite ready to retire.
Wednesday night Sturgis City Manager Andrew Kuk presented the Deferred Retirement Option Plan or DROP Program to the City Commission. This was discussed several years ago, and Kuk wanted to bring the idea back for another look.
Kuk explains that the DROP Program would be for employees who are in a position where they are eligible to retire, but may want to postpone that retirement and stay in active service.
The DROP Program is designed for cities to keep people in positions that are generally harder to replace, giving the city more time to find or train a replacement.
Kuk says while enrolled in DROP, employees would continue to receive their full regular wage and all benefits, except for those related to the defined benefit pension and disability pension provision. They would not be able to accrue service time towards their pension. (LISTEN ABOVE).
DROP account funds and retiree healthcare benefits can not be accessed until the employee formally retires and completes all required retirement processing.
The Commission unanimously directed Kuk to move forward and bring back a final draft of the program.