Quote:
Originally Posted by Keith P.
I thought councillors were not in the plan? Why was Hendsbee asking to be let in a few years ago?
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Because he did not join the plan when he had the opportunity. He wanted to join retroactively and have HRM and himself share the cost for the years he was not a member.
Councillors should have the option to have the HRM contribution and his contribution paid into a locked in RRSP and then seek professional advice as to where to invest the money.
I generally tell young people to invest in the top 3 banks and sign up for the dividend re-investment plan. And to open a TFSA and do the same - income from a TFSA is not taxable.
Mayors & members of council were in the pension plan for many years when they were supposed to have 33.333% of their pay as non-taxable and therefore their contributions to the pension plan would be based on 66.66% of their compensation. The payments into the pension plan for councillors was improperly based on 100% of the basic compensation. In essence, the taxpayer paid more into the pension fund than the admin order allowed. I had some written exchanges with an HRM staff member re the issue and whilst he failed to admit the mistake he made sure the issue was corrected when the by-law/admin order was amended over a year ago to allow automatic annual increases in council pay based on the average wage in HRM.
I have a copy of the old admin order as well as the staff report he helped write when the new admin order was debated and passed in August 2017.
https://www.halifax.ca/sites/default/files/documents/city-hall/legislation-by-laws/AO17.pdf
Councillor McCluskey was not in the pension plan because of her age.
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