Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

May 10, 2012

How many Americans are able to retire at 50 ? or younger? Lt. William Gardiner of the Washington State Highway Patrol retired at 50 last year after pulling in a salary of $163,000 in 2010. That figure was plumped up with $14,750 in overtime benefits.

Police union contracts generally dictate that pensions will be calculated on the basis of the salary paid in the last pre-retirement year. This is why police officers generally claim extravagant amounts of overtime just prior to retirement ? much of it based on stressless duties such as monitoring road construction or security for sporting events and concerts. Gardiner, however, got a touch too greedy, claiming 482 hours of overtime. If he had reined in his rapacity just a bit, he most likely would have avoided trouble.

Three police officers in El Paso are in similar trouble for overtime-related fraud dating back to 2009. One of them retired at age 43. El Paso, like most major municipalities, receives multi-million-dollar federal traffic enforcement grants, which are used to fund seat belt checkpoints and pay the overtime benefits of police assigned to traffic patrol.

Lt. Gardiner and his counterparts inEl Pasoapparently forgot that the secret to running a successful racket is to avoid being conspicuous.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.