The proposal comes as leaders of the Ohio Fire and Police Pension Fund, which serves more than 50,000 active and retired members, have sounded the alarms of the fund’s long-term solvency based on a surge of retirements, a lack of new recruits and a dipping investment market.
Credit: J SPIVEY PHOTOGRAPHY
Credit: J SPIVEY PHOTOGRAPHY
Vandalia Police Chief Kurt Althouse, testifying as president of the Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police last week, told the House Pensions Committee that it’s local governments’ turn to make sacrifices to stabilize the pension program after pension members shouldered a series of internal cost-saving measures.
“Unfortunately, since 2012, officers have shouldered the financial burden of stabilizing the pension system, with more than $3.2 billion in benefit cuts,” Althouse said. “These cuts have included raising the minimum retirement age, limiting cost-of-living adjustments, eliminating comprehensive health care benefits and replacing them with a stipend, and increasing employee contributions from 10% to 12.25%.”
H.B. 296 has garnered support from the Fraternal Order of Police of Ohio and the Ohio Association of Professional Fire Fighters.
If passed by both the House and the Senate, it would be the first time in nearly 40 years that the mandatory Ohio Police and Fire Pension Fund contribution rate for local governments has increased. Still, the mandate would come at considerable costs for local governments throughout Ohio.
In an interview with this outlet, Dayton Mayor Jeffrey Mims said he opposes H.B. 296 based on the fact that it would cost the city an additional $2.6 million per year and potentially limit the number of police and firefighters the city can afford to take on.
“Yeah, it will have an effect,” Mims told the Dayton Daily News. “Another five, six percent of our budget in that space (will be) encumbered, and we won’t have use of those dollars per se.”
While some advocates for the bill have argued that bolstering the pension can attract talent and make it easier for Ohio cities to hire more police and firefighters — two increasingly rare professions across the country — Mims argued that H.B. 296 would hamper cities’ fiscal ability to actually bring those public safety professionals onboard.
“It hurts us,” Mims said, “because it consumes money in that retirement pot that we could really use for salary, benefits and other types of things that we know by research and data have a direct impact on recruiting and retention.”
Mims’ concerns on the costs are also borne out in the official opposition to the bill offered by Beavercreek, Centerville, Vandalia, West Carrollton, and local government advocacy groups like the Ohio Municipal League and the Ohio Mayors Alliance and the Ohio Municipal League, which testified in November 2023 that an “unfunded mandate through this legislation could have the effect of raising the tax burden on local taxpayers who are already struggling with increased costs for housing, transportation, and day-to-day needs.”
Dayton-area Rep. Phil Plummer, R-Butler Twp., told this news outlet that he intends to vote in favor of the bill if it gets brought to the House floor but understands that it puts local governments in a bind.
“There’s rumors that cities might have to lay some people off or not add to their ranks because of these increases,” Plummer said. “That’s something they have to figure out in their own budgets.”
H.B. 296 is jointly sponsored by Butler County Rep. Thomas Hall, R-Madison Twp., who in an interview told this outlet that he had heard from his district’s largest city, Middletown, which echoed other municipalities’ concerns on affordability.
Credit: Nick Graham
Credit: Nick Graham
“I think it’s a very valid concern and I appreciate the opportunity to hear from the cities and to work with them,” said Hall, who teamed up with former Cincinnati policeman Rep. Cindy Abrams, R-Harrison, on the bill. “My opinion is that if it’s a priority, that they will fund it.”
Hall and Plummer each told this news outlet that, to make the pill easier to swallow, they’d support restoring some of the state government’s contributions to the local government fund — a pot of money to be distributed to local governments that the state cut extensively under Republican former Gov. John Kasich.
“I’m not opposed to (restoring the local government fund) because I’d seen the drastic cuts I had to make as a sheriff during all the Kasich years when he cut local government funds,” Plummer said. “It was tough.”
Hall, a volunteer firefighter, said his goal with H.B. 296 is solely to protect police and firefighter’s retirement funds.
“I think I’m the only fireman in the legislature; it’s my job, I feel, to communicate how important fire and police are,” he said.
H.B. 296 would also slightly raise the amount police and fire pension members themselves contribute, hiking today’s 12.25% rate to 12.5% beginning in 2030.
The bill was passed eight-to-three by the Ohio House Pension Committee last week and can now be brought to the House floor for a vote at the discretion of Speaker Jason Stephens, R-Kitts Hill. If passed by the House, it would move to the Senate for further consideration on a tight deadline, given that all of the legislature’s unfinished business expires at the end of the year.
For more stories like this, sign up for our Ohio Politics newsletter. It’s free, curated, and delivered straight to your inbox every Thursday evening.
Avery Kreemer can be reached at 614-981-1422, on X, via email, or you can drop him a comment/tip with the survey below.
About the Author
