Two of Douglas County's most experienced dispatchers are retiring in the near future. They will join a host of experienced county and school district employees who have already retired over the past two years.
If it seems like there are more government workers than ever retiring, it's because there are.
Some are leaving for their own reasons, but others are facing a little-talked-about financial issue.
Starting November of this year, employees of nonstate governments will be taken off the state's Public Employees Benefits Program.
The state system allowed small governments to participate in their system in the early 1990s. Then some larger governments, like the Clark County School District, decided to get into the act, dumping their retirees on the state system.
The upshot is that when the state bounces nonstate governmental workers out of the plan, their insurance costs are going to increase dramatically. Not 10 percent dramatically, but a multiple of 12. We've heard figures that say employees paying $50 a month now, would have to pay $600 in October.
Those workers who are retiring now will remain on the old system and get the lower cost insurance.
That's a big incentive to get out of the boat before it sinks.
