Court Opinion

ID: 9548760
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:08:28.839476+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:19:24.269892
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Pringle
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
With respect to contributions made to the Police Pension and Relief Fund by the named plaintiffs after June 1, 1947, I am in complete accord with the philosophy and result of the majority opinion. However, I do not agree that the same principles can be applied to payments made to the Pension Fund by the named plaintiffs by way of deductions from salary before June 1, 1947.
Article XX of the Colorado Constitution provides that officers in the Classified Civil Service should receive a stated salary, the amount of which shall be fixed by the charter. As a condition of their employment, the named plaintiffs were required to suffer a deduction from their salary for payment into the pension fund. *478It matters not, as I see it, that they may have received some benefit from this deduction. The organic law under which the City and County of Denver operates prohibits the City from, under any guise, reducing the salary of a Police Officer below the amount set by charter provision. The charter amendment of June 1, 1947 provided for a contribution to the pension fund to be deducted from salary. Before that date, in my view, the charter did not permit the City to require such a deduction.