an ordinance or an ordinance first approved by the city council in two thousand and three and then rescinded in twenty fifteen the ordinance approved at twenty thirty in two thousand and three was at that time referred to as a retirement incentive or a retirement pension and it was specifically designed to allow city employees to sell back to vacation time that they heard for the explicit purpose of raising their salaries in that period of the year when their for the calculation of their pension benefit there was no sunset provision there was no actual ration of that that was drafted to last forever in two thousand and three said the city loved the idea it was a transition period between administrations and this ordinance allowed senior members of the former administration to retire and out but also allowed other lower level of police to raise their salaries for purposes of their pensions all of them to retire fast forward to twenty fifteen and that desired retirement incentive became a dreaded pensions fight because in the period between twenty thirteen and twenty fifteen the city determined through required payments  kyra exactly how much this retirement center would cost so in twenty fifteen the city under the changes in the ordinance that it is that is at issue in this case the city under the changes pension calculation formula it changed back from the calculation of salary eliminating the vacation pay and said it was our position that that attempt to change the direct variable in the pension calculation formula is unconstitutional is contrary to the pension protection clause which on its face applies to retirement systems of the state and any unit of local government the changes direct changes to the pension formula in other cases have been declared unconstitutional as well right and should reform involve five changes to the formula shinobi of the minimum retirement age and a cap on salary direct variables of the formula and the supreme court obviously struck down those changes the cro statute change the the formula from one half of salary that kind of retirement to one half of the salary at the time that the firefighter with this ability to be a period of years and  obviously that are mental to the to the employee that was held unconstitutional as a change to a direct variable in the pension fuck you wish the felt it involved changes court found that that was a change to a direct variable in the pension calculation and unconstitutional the same result obtained here this was a ordinance  finance salary for the purpose of pension calculations and that's changed became a part of the pension contract between the city and each employee of the city on the effective  that ordinance or for employees who came on afterwards employees who were on their first day of employment with the city in great pension reform makes clear that the pension benefits in talks about pension benefits being a contract between the oil and the employer this case that we're seeing and that opportunity extend to the city of poisons became part of the contract in two thousand and three and for each employee hired after two thousand and three mr craven let me ask you a question you mentioned in re pension reform and in that case they focused on the fact that the benefits flow from membership in one of the state's insurance systems do we have that here yes how so because the the calculation of salary is defined by hundred twenty five percent this ordinance was designed to allow salary to be calculated because the payment was four hundred twenty five percent will prohibits increases over that about the last three months springfield are growing title to take advantage of this but it wasn't necessarily based on you being a member of i am already or at every i am r f member could not take advantage of this ev who could take advantage of it was a member of i am aware of the benefit flows only because of their membership and i am more about compliance with those regulations and that's it it's those regulations and the contract between the employee employer in the face of the city because the city i'm going to make one up so god help me i'm right in the city joliet doesn't have this arrangement with with its employees i am already in there in their amicus brief no that the decision to include this as salary is entirely within the discretion of the city but it is a contract between the city and its employees the form the basis of the of the application in the purpose of being able to cash it out to enhance their pensions at the time retire  disability just as the felt the change in the felt case change the definition of the calculation of salary for judges just as the denial of this is the change in the the end it as in this case in that case the the the statute had been changed and there were they imposed a deadline on when you could do that that change in the statute that changed in the imposition of a deadline when you  the city as it should relies on the peterson case was changed the mandatory retirement age for firefighters and or for the four police officers the protest book but peter's age was not a direct variable in the calculation the calculation the pension was based on the it percentage of the monthly salary attached to right at the time of retire how old  retirement but the calculation that miller was dependent on age and was dependent on because of the salary of the formula was fixed at age sixty three but age was a direct factor in miller it was not a direct factor in peter's peter's so so that distinguishes peter's from this case the cross case which i mentioned earlier also talks about incidental changes to and for police and firefighters it can be argued is a is a matter of public safety fire fighting and and policing are our young people's jobs and public safety requires a communications from city staff to the to the city council the time this ordinance this change was was proposed in twenty fifteen wasn't designed to be an incidental it was designed only for the purpose of decreasing pension benefits payable to city employees and city retirees over the years there's nothing in state law that prohibits what the city don't want you if you don't want that effect don't grant the benefit but once you grant the benefit and once you change that contract once you sweeten that that pension benefit from between the city and its employees can be diminished  for all those reasons and here in the absence of a question all i would ask for the first will be trial court and reserve my time for rebuff thank you in question is not a benefit that is derived from the pension code that's the fundamental flaw in the argument that the plaintiffs have made to make and circuit court and are making again today the city ordinance is really an employee policy that the city has and to put it a little bit in perspective i am r f represents approximately three thousand different entities which is why this case has a certain concern with you've got mosquito abatement districts you've got sanitary districts you've got water districts municipalities small cities counties library districts etc cross the state all of those have a myriad of employment policies how they pay their employees how they deal with overtime how they deal with this with glenn how they deal with union contracts etc if you apply literally what the plaintive is trying to make an argument here that those employment policies the rate of pay you know what discipline might be imposed some of those different issues then in effect what you would be doing is freezing in place the employment policies of all of those i m  members even though none of those members can change the i'm or a pension code they can't grant a pension they can't do anything in connection with the i r f process and in this specific case ironically the ordinance that was passed applies more than to just i am r f it applied police and fire they're not part of fire mara and so the concept if you look at the the real right at the very crux of the plaintiff argument this is not a benefit that derives from the i m r of pension code it is a local employment policy that the city adopted some years ago and has found to be too costly as a policy and just to put it in perspective if you look at what the m r f micus reef highlighted in these were some of the argue in court if you take it live in the circuit or with the local court if you take it literally the city of springfield had to do furlough days a few years back because of the bad budget situation under that argument the city could not do furlough days because in theory it would have that incidentally impact because you're reducing the income the salary of the employee by taking for forcing furlough days which i e would then eventually impact the pension so when you take it through the process of the city were to enter into a labor contract granting four percent raises subsequent to that with fire or police subsequent to that negotiated a change to that contract two percent under the argument against making the city couldn't do that because once it was in place you could never stop it and so that's the fundamental flaw that when you look at the argument and literally apply each of the cases that distinction here that's the distinction that happened in peter's and when you read literally the the vacation payout holocene the city council is a city of springfield council adopted and subsequently modified of an employee which is different than furlough days is does not have the express purpose of diminishing a benefit here it is to give workers the opportunity to learn hands to benefit and one would assume and i think you can see that when originally adopted it was for the benefit of all and then later is determined to be no impact the pension directly and there's no one to provide the opportunity to do enhanced well it be by virtue of adopting him you've provided that enhanced and what i'm go back i don't think that it matters or is a distinction under the can earn decisions which was interpret in the illinois constitution regarding the in any way impacting in a negative fashion a preexisting pension benefit this is not their ride for whatever reason to save money if if the city of springfield or the springfield park district were the same and county said everybody has to take a three percent pay cut because our costs are too high and it's going to save us x millions of dollars in future pension costs that does not invalidate that that's something that a local government entity hasta happy of forty under its employment policies even though it has an indirect impact because keep in mind that springfield or any participant in arm or a kid does not change the pension calculation it cannot award a p to participate in it but the city in no way can set the pension effect the pension changes like if we decide they should put more in in other words an employee should contribute more should contribute less city has no say so about that's a smatter ordinances the only thing they can do is affect local employees for example this one is in question on with without an issue only applies to the city of springfield it doesn't apply to all three thousand other entities employees that by definition excludes it from being in high m r f benefit because it only applies to the local employees not all of them i am araa because police and fire have separate pension systems so the the difficulty with all of this is that they're trying to the plaintiffs trying to extend that argument to reach things outside of the pension code by making the argument well if you promise a person a pay raise or if you do you know do all of these various things that go into their compensation package or whether it's sick sick day payouts vacation pay outs whether it's you get overtime or you get compensatory t that can impact your pension and do local bodies try to make decisions that try to be fiscally responsible in relation to what they're doing as it relates to pension future pension costs without a doubt future pension liabilities so this is not something that's going away this is an incredibly significant problem and from the from a city's point of view the city has to take into account not only the what it's pain currently but what are the implications for the future and if they are if they're not able to do that then you've really gone way outside what the illinois constitution was talking about about the pension that the  reducing a pension benefit that's as a matter of state law because these are not state law matters these are local matters where the city council or county board or whatever is trying to decide fit within the budget how many people to hire what can you pay em what should be our overtime policies what are of our you know can we afford to pay vacation at the end to keep people from using it or encourage them not to or do we take all of that away because of the costs are such that the taxpayers just can't afford that so when you drill down to the sure basic argument the city's view is that this is not something that is derived from the pension code if you read literally the decision to every single case that the plane of the cited has been a case where there's been an attempt to change the pension code to change it or change a variable in the code to the detriment of the members of the current members so is there a difference variable at all what what what what me and you had asked was does the fact for example let's take the salary let's just say there's an adjustment in salary everybody has to pay that two percent pay or something of that nature that changes the input it doesn't change the variable that's the distinction right there the city has no authority to change a variable you know the county the formula which nobody but that's that's exactly right and again that in my view at least is what i would call an incidental impact because every single thing the city does incidentally impacts the future pension benefit by virtue of even what salary patient because it's an input it's an input so it is a mortar the interest of public policy with us this power makes the calculation that this is simply not sustain the immediately change the policy for future hires this is not affecting their pension if you if you say to the new employee we used to have this policy we i would they if if we're talking about fiscal responsibility and again this is curiosity i don't know that it has i don't know that it would have a very on my thought process but i'm trying to figure out why there's not acknowledging that we can't do do that or is it would it be your understanding of municipal law that that's something that it is fallon's look at i would i would answer it in this way any new employee would be subject to the ordinance but any group but are they are they instructed in it like given a notice i don't think so and i would say might give it they might be given a of a a sheet that says you know here's you know here's your salary here's your sick day here sure they cation that you earn in those kind of things but i don't know that it w highlight specifically that policy or until this case is concluded you've got two plus years of hires yes that you don't know what you're going to be able in the future when i am going to do this anymore and i'm asking as a matter of public policy so it's you're managing the public  why not do that well if this is something that was and then wise choice earlier or it isn't a viable choice anymore why is it that then proactively to make sure that it doesn't that it applies to new hires in other words i think their view would be since they weren't hired that you might ask him on on rebuttal but i think they would say since they weren't hired and the ordinance was applied they have no is the city council decided not to do that make a prospective it was a legislative decision on the part of the city council that was debated in terms of application of when would this change take give people notice in case people did want to retire it was a matter of fairness but they chose not to make it just to apply to new hires it was a legislative decision and i hope i haven't gotten too far on arlington and again i think that just very briefly the key in on this issue is whether or not it is a benefit derived from the pension code and the city believes very strongly that if you read the decisions that i give has relied upon they're all relating to attempts to change the state engine code in some manner that would affect existing members of the city cannot change the arm mention of it can't calculate it can't grant the pension we're totally independent i'm more of a state agency it's a state entity created by state law so the most that the city can ever do is affect its local employment hala sees and it's not clear when you know when you try to maybe in a broader way answer justice your question it's not always clear that when a decision is made ten years ago outlooks ten years later and so that's the problem that you have here what was intended i think originally as a  employment policy has turned out to be not something that makes good public policy sense on an economic level and so it in no way changed the i'm or pension code it's only changing any inputs and ironically the ordinance that's in place of course applies only to city employees not all the other i'm around pension participants across the state but it also applies to non i am our members so it's not something in any way  existence of the armor and and of again i think just very briefly the concern the city has marmara as is that really when you take literally what the plaintive is trying to argue it goes way beyond the a a louse for overtime to go into the pension police and fire don't but primarily do so all of these factors are implodes and none of them change the tension how can lation the the variable itself and so that's the reason that the city would be respectfully request that the circuit or the court's decision or court's decision basically be affirmed and we do not believe that the ordinance is invalid under those decisions we think it only has incidental impact it doesn't change the pension i'm or so thank you very much thank you mr circle any rebuttal mr c paragraph forty one of the conservative suit defendants contend that the reach of article thirteen section five is confined to the retirement the new the payments authorised by the pension but there is nothing in the text of the constitution that warrants such a limitation just as the legislature is presumed to act with full knowledge of all ireland to slay sion the drafters of a constitutional provision or presume to know about existing laws and prostitution provisions and to have drafted their provision accordingly if they had intended to protect only core pension annuity benefits and to exclude the various other benefits state employees were and are entitled to receive as a result of membership in the state pension systems the preppers could have so specified they did not the text of the provision proposed to an adopted by the voters of the state did not limit its terms to annuities or to benefits conferred directly by the pension code which would also include disability coverage and survivor benefits rather the drafters chose expanse of white woods that goes beyond annuities and the terms of the pension code defining the range of protected benefits broadly to encompass those attendant to membership in the state's retirement system then as now subsidize health care was one of those benefits for us to hold that such benefits are not among the benefits protected by the constitution would require us to construe article thirteen section five in a way that does not fit in a way that the plain language of the provision does not support we may not rewrite the present protection clause to include restrictions and limitations that the drafters did not express and the citizens of illinois did not approve there is nothing nothing in section thirty in article in the pension code for purposes of calculation of salary the element at issue here is the definition of salary and the and and the input into that formula for the calculation of a pension benefit that can never talks about the man and analyzes the issue of whether or not the health insurance subsidy qualifies as a benefit of membership and mr circle has made the point to wise that that is the real inquiry pension under the i m r out based on years of service and salary on the salary over a period of time prior to retire this changes the specifically changes and was intended to change the calculation of salary the calculation of that benefit not everybody has to do the same way as they are left grief suggests every every i am or if participating agency can have different rules about big pay how they pay overtime pay doesn't matter the contract between the employer and the attempting to do with this or that they wanted to diminish those pension benefits available the city employees based on the calculation so limited by the constitutional provision of justice her miers decision in rate heads of litigation rather eloquently set out the limitations on legislat bodies as determined by the voters and the citizens in the constitution that pension protection falls place here he would ask the river if they think it will take this matter under advisement and