Nebraska State Troopers Want Back Pension Contributions

The lawsuit says the 411 troopers agreed to pay fixed percentages of their salaries to the retirement fund when they were hired, with the state paying a matching contribution, but the Nebraska Legislature has ordered troopers to pay an increased percentage of their compensation seven times between 1995 and 2011, according to the Omaha World-Herald. As a result, the rates grew from 8% of pay in 1995 to 19% this year, the lawsuit says.  

The average a trooper now pays is $1,000 per month to the pension plan, said Scott Black, a member of the State Troopers Association of Nebraska and one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit. “Each and every trooper is willing to lay down his or her life on any given day, and in exchange we simply ask the state to keep the promise it made to each of us when we joined the force,” Black said, according to the news report.  

The troopers have never agreed to the increases under employment contracts that are set by state law; therefore, the mandatory increase in pension withholding violated terms of employment, along with the “contracts clause” of the U.S. Constitution, said Gary Young of Lincoln, a lawyer representing the troopers. “The increased rates don’t give them additional benefits,” Young said Tuesday. “It just requires them to pay more into the retirement system.”  

Troopers have made state officials aware of their objections to the rate increases, Young said, but by law, they cannot bargain for retirement benefits, so their only recourse is a lawsuit.  

The Omaha World-Herald said defendants named in the lawsuit are Governor Dave Heineman, Treasurer Don Stenberg, former Treasurer Shane Osborn and Carlos Castillo, director of the Department of Administrative Services.