Tuscaloosa Police, Fire Urge Council To Commit To RSA Conversion In 2026

TUSCALOOSA, AL — More than half a dozen first responders stood up straight, several with their arms crossed, in the Tuscaloosa City Council conference room for Tuesday's Finance Committee meeting as city leaders mulled over the proposed conversion of the city's police and fire pension fund to the Retirement Systems of Alabama (RSA).

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The City Council later on Tuesday night would ultimately vote to suspend the rules during its regular meeting and approved the adoption of a resolution committing to RSA conversion in 2026.

The measure will now be placed on the city's legislative agenda for the 2023 legislative session that begins in January.

"We are so grateful to the mayor and city council for starting this conversion process," Blankley told Patch following Tuesday's meeting. "It means a great deal to us and is truly appreciated. RSA will make us a more attractive department for new officers and will help us retain current officers. Our officers work hard everyday and deserve a good retirement.”

In lookin at the debate earlier in the day, however, one is reminded that the major conversion has been a longstanding debate in City Hall for years, especially as recruiting and retention for the city's fire and police departments were recently brought into sharper focus due to unprecedented staffing issues throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

Historically, public service jobs have been attractive for strong benefits, the City of Tuscaloosa has had a difficult time competing with other area agencies that offer state retirement and benefits, resulting in widely-documented turnover and issues filling open positions.

For instance, Tuscaloosa Police Chief Brent Blankley told Finance Committee members Tuesday that his force is 33 officers short of full staffing at present. This comes at a time when TPD reports losing an average of one officer a week.

For Tuscaloosa Fire Rescue, data provided to Patch by the department shows the number of applicants has fallen more than 65% since 2016. What's more, TFR says 45% of its 31 resignations since 2016 were the result of firefighters leaving for other departments.

On the other side of the Black Warrior River, Northport Fire Rescue is on RSA, but Fire Chief Bart Marshall told Patch that he couldn't recall one instance during his time as chief where a Tuscaloosa firefighter left the department to come work for Northport.

Instead, Northport is one of the most attractive employers in the sector due to the benefits it offers and has a leg up when it comes to luring new recruits.

Still, other reasons cited by TFR for turnover are the potential health risks of the job, poor pay and weak benefits. Indeed, TFR Public Information Officer Holly Whigham told Patch that 28 candidates have declined conditional job officers since 2016 and, just in the last three months, five prospective candidates turned down offers in favor of better pension plans elsewhere.

Since January 2020 for the Tuscaloosa Police Department, there have been a total of 136 departures, according to department data, compared to only 127 new hires.

Along with turnover, experience on the force is another issue unto itself, with the Tuscaloosa Police Department reporting 43% of its force has less than five years experience, with 9% having less than a year on the job.

Blankley is typically a measured and calm presence in the public eye, but when urging city officials on Tuesday to commit to a conversion to RSA by 2026, his face began to redden and the passion in his voice echoed the longstanding sentiments of Tuscaloosa police officers and firefighters, alike.

"Y'all want me to fill the ranks, the city wants to be safe," Blankley said. "It's not an option. It's got to [be converted by] 2026. I don't know how we get there, but we've got to do it."

Indeed, many other city officials have shared Blankley's support of the measure, while at the same time harboring their own concerns over just how the city will manage such a large transition. The conversion is a complex and slow-moving one that, regardless of city support on Tuesday, would ultimately be left up to the state legislature to approve whenever the city decides to move forward.

But when talks turned to pushing the target conversion date to 2027, Blankley underscored the urgency in recruiting and retention at a time when TPD is regularly losing experienced officers to the University of Alabama Police Department, the Tuscaloosa County Sheriff's Office and the Northport Police Department — all of who

In October, TPD data showed 237 of 289 allotted positions had been filled by sworn officers who can answer calls and work cases, essentially leaving the department operating at 82% staffing.

"I've got officers daily [asking] 'what are we doing?' What are we doing? If the financials have been done, you know, and we push keep pushing and pushing and pushing, I don't want to lose two more officers waiting for a commitment from the city council. Is it unreasonable that next Tuesday we have a vote out of Council?"

The Tuscaloosa Police Officers & Firefighters Retirement Plan was first established in 1959 and has been amended 16 times — most recently in 2020.

Issues raised in the past regarding the plan call into question the calculation of benefits received in relation to the years of service and ranking/employment level of the policy holder at the time of retirement. Another criticism of the pension plan can be seen in its requirement that a percentage of the employee's salary to be paid by each participant, while not taking that same metric into account when formulating payment amounts.

What's more, as argued by the Tuscaloosa Police Department, the only option for a survivor’s benefit is for the beneficiary to receive 42.41% of the members pension base — coming out to a maximum of $1,172.

During Tuesday's meeting, though, Blankley also voiced his frustrations when the Finance Committee opted against taking any action on a formal commitment to conversion by 2026 in favor of taking up the matter again during the committee's meeting next week.

District 4 Councilor Lee Busby, who chairs the Committee, responded by saying that while the request wasn't necessarily unreasonable, he wasn't sure how "meaningful" the proposed action would be.

Instead, Busby went on to say that while every council member would be likely to vote in favor of the RSA conversion when the time came, too many big-picture questions linger relating to the complex financials of the transition.

"Me and [Tuscaloosa Fire Chief Randy Smith] can tell our men and women over and over again, 'hey, this [conversion to RSA] is coming,'" Blankley responded. "We're working on it and we're sitting in meetings, but until you all say and do that resolution that says [the Council is] going toward [RSA], we're just spitting words. And that's why we want that hard commitment of possibly getting it out of the next committee meeting."

Blankley reiterated the need to recruit quality officers and fill the open positions on the force, while also lamenting delays and uncertainty in the overall process.

And with respect to problems on the recruiting trail for TPD, it's not for a lack of effort, as the department has made strides to invest in career fairs, hiring a full-time TPD recruiter, hosting community engagement events, providing online recruiting and other efforts.

"I know that you may say, what's a week? What's two weeks? What's three weeks?" Blankley said. "But it adds up when I'm losing one officer, two officers. And it's no disrespect to anybody in this room, but we're fighting tooth and nail for officers. So when you all speak and say, 'we're going to RSA,' it means something."

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