Heather Curtis
WMAL.com

WASHINGTON (WMAL) – Some Montgomery County councilmembers think the county executive’s proposal to balance the $5.7 billion budget for the Fiscal Year 2020 by forgoing contributions to a benefit fund for retired employees is financially irresponsible.

County Executive Marc Elrich said delaying payments to the post-employment benefits trust fund, which provides money for health benefits for county government retirees, for FY19 would enable the county to increase its reserve accounts by 10 percent, and it would not mean any cut to benefits for current or future retirees.

“The decision to delay OPEB funding for a year is, I believe, the most prudent course of action with just months left in the fiscal year,” Elrich said in a press release in March 2019.

Council member Hans Riemer disagrees.

“I don’t support taking the funding out of that benefit fund. I think it’s a mistake,” Riemer said.

Council member Andrew Friedson is concerned that the county is drawing on a one time savings to fund ongoing expenses, which he said is the definition of unsustainable. He said the county owes that money, and it can pay it now or later.

“If we pay later it gets much more expensive because effectively what we’re doing is we’re forgoing the investment gains that we would have in the trust fund, and in that sense, this is more expensive than taking on debt,” Friedson said.

Councilmember Hans Riemer said there are other ways to balance the budget, including attrition. He said if they don’t delay payments into OPEB they would likely have to make some cuts, but he thinks they could get through it “without too much pain and difficulty” if they work together on a solution.

WMAL reached out to the county’s budget director Rich Madaleno for this story but did not hear back by deadline.

The council will hold a public hearing on Elrich’s proposal Tuesday afternoon at 1:30.

Copyright 2019 by WMAL.com. All Rights Reserved. Photo Credit: Marc Elrich for County Executive Facebook