Riverhead supervisor pitches early retirement program for town workers

Riverhead Town Supervisor Jerry Halpin is proposing an early retirement incentive program for town employees, arguing the initiative could generate long-term savings for taxpayers while creating opportunities for employee advancement and higher pay.

Halpin announced the proposal in a video posted Tuesday morning on the town’s social media platforms. In the video, Halpin said the proposal was made possible by stronger-than-expected 2025 revenues and investment earnings reflected in the town’s recently completed annual financial report.

Halpin said the idea originated with a CSEA employee earlier this year and would require discussions with the three unions, the CSEA, which represents most of the town’s workforce and the two unions that represent the town’s police officers, the Police Benevolent Association and the Superior Officers Association.  

He said he discussed the idea with the town’s financial administrator. “What we discovered was that this plan can work because of the 2025 revenues, and has the potential to immediately save up to 3% for Riverhead taxpayers in 2027 and create a tax saving for the next five years,” Halpin said in the video announcement.

“So, I say it’s time to sit down with our CSEA, PBA, and SOA leadership to create a shared path to success, a path to save taxpayers, honor our long-term workers, and create advancement opportunities,” Halpin said in the video. “So I’m asking my fellow board members to consider this option with our willing CSEA, PBA, and SOA leadership.”

His office issued a press release shortly after the video was posted. The press release did not offer details about the proposed incentive program.

Riverhead Town has offered early retirement incentive programs to employees at least three times over the past two decades. The town offered the incentive in 2019 during the administration of then-supervisor Laura Jens-Smith, in the course of contract negotiations with the CSEA. It offered a retirement incentive for PBA members in 2012, and for CSEA members in 2010. Both the 2010 and 2012 incentives were offered outside of union contract negotiations and both were adopted by Town Board resolution after public hearings.

Retirement incentive programs can offer a variety of benefits to employees, such as enhanced post-retirement health insurance benefits or one-time payments; sometimes the programs offer a combination of benefits to entice employees to participate. 

The program can produce benefits to the town by reducing payroll costs, since long-term employees receive higher pay pursuant to union contracts.  The incentive program can also significantly reduce  the town’s fringe benefit obligations, since retirement and health insurance costs for long-term employees are higher than for newer employees. The benefit savings come as a result of changes to the state retirement system and new collective bargaining agreements that require new employees to contribute a greater portion of their health insurance premiums. 

In a phone interview Tuesday afternoon Halpin, with financial administrator Jeanette DiPaola present,  declined to discuss specifics of his proposal. 

Since an agreement is not yet completed with the unions, he said, “we just want to make sure we don’t mess something up or speak out of turn,” Halpin said.  He said there would be a time of service and age “filter” for eligibility. It would involve a one-time payout, he said. 

DiPaola said an important goal for the town in offering the incentive is to establish predictability in the town’s obligations. 

“Most of [the eligible employees] qualify already, so they already have their accrued time that they’re entitled to when they retire. The problem is they could retire next year after the budgets are already done,” she said. With an incentive program in place, the town could nail down its obligation and budget for it, she said. 

The town could cover the cost of the incentive with savings in 2025 budgeted expenditures and with interest earnings that came in $1.4 million over what was projected in the 2025 adopted budget, DiPaola said.

Halpin declined to discuss the anticipated cost of the incentive. 

“We want to wait till after the work session,” Halpin said. “We’re not ready to release that… I need the board to be willing to do this, the other board members.”

So far, the matter has not appeared on a Town Board work session and there has been no public discussion of the proposal. In a phone interview Tuesday morning, Halpin said he “floated the idea” with board members and they weren’t interested.

Two other board members reached Tuesday afternoon disputed the supervisor’s characterization.

Council members Ken Rothwell and Joann Waski said Halpin unexpectedly brought it up during a recent executive session. Both said the supervisor’s staff distributed to board members a summary of the terms and projected numbers, allowed board members to briefly review it and then required board members to return the documents.

The matter has not been listed as an executive session discussion item on Town Board work session agendas going back to early February.

Rothwell sharply criticized both the substance of the proposal and the way it was introduced.

“You want to do this, you want to have these discussions, then you do it in the open,” Rothwell said in a phone interview Tuesday. “It’s budgetary. It’s not executive session.”

Council Member Joann Waski also questioned why the proposal had not been publicly discussed in a work session and said board members were not provided enough information to evaluate it.

“I’d like to discuss it in work session, so that people can hear,” Waski said. “I’d like to know what exactly is the payout for the early retirement.”

Waski said she supports exploring an incentive program, particularly for CSEA employees, whom she said first raised the idea with the administration. But she said she was concerned by the lack of specifics.

“You’re asking us basically to dive into our fund balance,” Waski said. “You’re not telling us exactly how much we’re going to have to take out.”

Halpin defended discussing the matter privately, saying he viewed it as related to negotiations with union bargaining units. Rothwell and Waski  disputed that characterization, arguing the issue is fundamentally a budget matter that should be discussed publicly.

The debate comes as Riverhead officials continue grappling with employee retention and compensation issues. Town officials have repeatedly cited difficulties competing with salaries offered by neighboring municipalities and other government agencies.

Halpin said the incentive program would allow more junior employees to secure promotions and higher pay, while still saving the town money. 

Waski agreed.

“For the CSEA, I think it’s a great thing for them, and I think it’s great for our town, and for the employees to be able to bump up the salaries to compete with other towns,” she said.

Rothwell, however, questioned whether using fund balance reserves for retirement payouts would undermine the town’s long-term financial stability and ability to fund grant-matching requirements and capital projects.

“We have to keep an excellent [amount] of money in fund balance because that increases our bond rating,” Rothwell said. “You go and rob fund balance — great, you get a one-time savings to the taxpayers. You cancel multiple town projects.”

If there’s money in fund balance, Rothwell said, it “belongs to the taxpayers first and foremost. So, if there’s money that we’ve invested that’s a good return, that should go back to the taxpayers before we start campaigning to try to bring in unions and the police department and try to utilize them in a campaign tactic.”

Rothwell, who is challenging Halpin in the November election for town supervisor,  also complained about Halpin recording his pitch for the incentive apparently in his town office, and posting it to the town’s social media platforms. “He’s campaigning on town property using town resources,” Rothwell said.