Issue link: https://newsleader.uberflip.com/i/107047
PONDERING A FIX The Sarasota City Commission hears public comments during a recent meeting. Photo by Norman Schimmel THE SARASOTA CITY COMMISSION AGREES TO CONSIDER USING AN EMPLOYEE LIFE INSURANCE PLAN TO TRY TO HELP PLUG THE PENSION DEBT HOLE By Stan Zimmerman City Editor It was as if a Gothic curse were hanging in the air Tuesday, Jan. 29, in the chambers of the Sarasota City Commission: "The world will be a better place without you." a bundle and applies it to the enormous shortfall in the pension plans. It is a double windfall for the city: no more retiree to pay for and a big check from the life Nobody said that, of course. But cutting insurance company. through all the verbal underbrush in a meetDEVILISH DETAILS ing about pension fund shortfalls, the solution on the table was grisly. It is a solution adopted There was doom and gloom in the room as by thousands of banks and corporations, and Mark Pollock pointed out the holes in the the city is among the first municipalities to city's pension and healthcare plans for its retirees. He is the principal in the Pollock Financonsider it. cial Group of Novelty, OH, and he is a self-adIn a nutshell, the city takes out a life insurance mitted salesman for the plan he pitched to the policy on its employees and retirees. When city commissioners. His street address is on the grim reaper comes calling, the city makes Trappers Trail.