The city has drafted an agreement that would allow Lee Bercaw, a 28-year veteran with the force, to[retire and then] immediately be hired back by the city as a contractor to continue serving as chief after he retires in September.
The maneuver would allow him to cash in on an annual pension payment worth at least $96,000 while continuing to collect one of the largest paychecks in city government. The proposal, which includes a double-digit pay raise, is set to go before the Tampa City Council later this week.
He would earn a $241,000 salary per year plus benefits such as annual leave, health insurance and sick pay. He also would be entitled to pay bumps associated with annual performance reviews and for cost-of living increases applicable to other city management employees.
That’s insane.
I’m sure he provides more worth to that community than an extra 3 teachers. I’m sure there is no better use of that money, they must really need that man to be willing to overpay him so much…
Hey those minorities ain’t gonna harass themselves.
Considering the salary for 10 years xp is 60k, the pension + salary is enough to pay for 6 teachers… Maybe 7 if you costed all the other benefits.
Nah those are charter schools.
Hillsborough pays worse: 47.5k for the first 10 years and then it starts going up. 60k is 25 years of experience.
(Pay starts on page 9)
Edit: note if you want to count out teacher benefits it’s maybe ~10k per teacher, with 3% to retirement and then like 8.8k for medical. Add the pay roll tax, the $300 a year for supplies, and $600 extra pay for for ~25-30 hours of training every year (get paid maybe $20-25/hr for trainings instead of full amount) and you’re at like $62,300 per teacher in total cost to the county. Note I’m ignoring teacher incentive pay as he also gets it and it’s likely proportional so, I’m ignoring that. But yeah that is minimum 5.5 full cost teachers for just his direct salary+pension.
Yeah, but we need cops because of what happens in places like CHAZ.
It’s cool how people with anointed titles can get raises and cost-of-living bumps while huge swaths of the population try to eke out a living with flat incomes for long stretches of time.
The dude is seriously experienced and extremely qualified and educated for the position. So if he’s actually providing significant value to the community then, while there is obviously shadiness going on here, it might not be the worst thing in the world. That said, I would be somewhat interested to hear an objective analysis of his record on what value he has provided to the community.
Experienced at being a dick! Fuck Tampa PC! I’ve been harassed by those asshole waaaay too many times. Especially when you factor that I’m white and don’t even live in Tampa. I can’t imagine what kind of hell it is to be a minority there.
