11-28-2018 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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healthy reserve fund balance. Since PTO has now been in use for five years, many of the long- term employees are reaching the maximum accumulation every year. The unintended consequence is that these employees are taking many days off at the end of year simply to not lose their PTO time. This can be problematic when it is multiple employees in the same department. The additional PTO hours accumulated would also help an employee be able to supplement their STD benefits. PTO Conversion Amendment- New Policy Currently all PTO over the maximum accrual amount is lost if not used by the end of the year. Each year during November and December, there are times when several people in the same department are out of the office at the same time using their excess PTO in order not to lose it. Some cities offer a PTO “cash out” conversion option at the end of each year. This type of policy would allow employees the option to cash out a certain number of hours at the end of the year versus taking the days off. Staff is proposing a PTO Conversion policy that allows employees who have more than the maximum hours of banked PTO at the end of the year, to convert up to 5 days (40 hours) to cash or deferred compensation. Miscellaneous Amendments There are several housekeeping amendments for updating position titles and correcting section references. Summary of all proposed Personnel Policy changes: - Move from a self-funded STD plan to a City-paid STD plan through Unum - Change the STD benefits waiting period from 15 days to 30 days, if the Council chooses a longer waiting period - Increase the maximum allowed PTO accrual amount from 30 days to 45 days - Adopt a PTO Conversion Policy to allow up to 40 hours of excess PTO at the end of the year to be converted to cash or deferred compensation - Housekeeping amendments: updated position titles and correcting section references These proposed PTO and Short Term Disability changes are a benefit for the employees in that they would no longer pay $10.00 per month for their STD policy and could bank more PTO, but the drawback is 15 more days to wait before STD benefits begin (if the Council chooses a STD 30 waiting period). Another issue could be a new employee who has not yet accrued 15 or 30 days of PTO, would not be paid between when their banked PTO runs out and day 30 when STD benefits begin. There is a PTO Donation policy that may possibly help employees who do not have enough days accrued, or employees could purchase supplemental insurance programs, such as AFLAC. The proposed changes to the personnel policy are attached. The waiting period was changed in the following pages to 30 days, but can be left as is in the policy at 15 days if the Council chooses. Several parts of the STD section are shown to be removed since we would be following Unum’s policies rather than the City’s. A benefits survey of Ramsey County cities and a few others that have PTO is also attached. The survey shows that every city who offers STD, allows a maximum PTO accrual amount of more days than what it would take an employee to get to their first day of STD benefits.