Township Committee Discusses Salaries, Health Benefits

An ordinance eliminating health care benefits for Montville Township's elected officials was approved on April 13, 2010 but did not take effect until June 1 of this year.

The Township Committee discussed the issues that arose from this ordinance at their regular meeting Tuesday night. One challenge that the committee faced stemmed from Montville Township's policy regarding the termination of town employees.

During the 30 days after an employee is terminated, whether voluntarily or involuntarily, the town has a policy of opting to pay for one month of COBRA health insurance for that employee.

Committee member Scott Gallopo expressed concern at the fact that this policy overruled the power of the ordinance to eliminate health benefits.

"I don’t have a problem with any of this going forward, but it makes me wonder how things like this can happen … This [ordinance] has created some issues for us that we don’t need," Gallopo said.

Gallopo said the legal counsel "waited until the eleventh hour" to inform the committee, which created challenges, because with health benefits ending on June 1, the committee was not aware that one month of COBRA benefits would be paid for by the town for any member of the committee whose benefits were eliminated.

Some of the issues brought up during the meeting included committeewoman Deb Nielson's possible eligibility to receive money from COBRA and the impact of the new ordinance on the salaries of town employees. Nielson made a point to emphasize the fact that although it might have been possible for her to receive the benefits for 30 days at the taxpayers' expense, she chose to pay for her coverage during that time period out of her own pocket.

A new salary ordinance, scheduled for introduction on Tuesday night stated that “any member of the Township Committee who obtained Township paid health insurance benefits prior to the elimination of benefits for Township Committee persons on June 1, 2011, shall have deducted from their salary an amount of $1,750.00 for the year 2011.”

The ordinance was supposed to be resolved at Tuesday's meeting, but the absence of committee member Don Kostka due to illness led to a split vote, with Nielson and Deputy Mayor Tim Braden voting against, and Mayor Jim Sandham and Scott Gallopo voting for the introduction of the ordinance.

With the vote split, the salary ordinance will have to be voted on again at a later meeting.

Committee members weren't the only ones to take issue with these ordinances; resident Dan Pagano, who spoke during the public portion of the meeting, saw the discussion of health benefits and salaries in terms of accountability, shifting the focus from the ordinances to the policy that utilizes taxpayer dollars to pay for COBRA health benefits.

He quoted Thomas Sowell, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institute of Stanford University and author of "Intellectuals and Society," saying, "Without accountability, there is no constraint against irresponsibility."

The next township committee meeting will be held on June 28.