Page 16 - August 2017

55 to Medicare and retirement
If you are planning to retire in 2018 to take advantage of the 55 to Medicare health in- surance, you must have your PAR form in
by October 1, 2017. Your retiree health insurance will cost you 2 percent of
to leave for the Daley Center when Krislov called and said the judge was out sick. The case is continued to Sept. 14,
2017.
COPA
We are in free fall and haven’t hit bottom. The mayor and the Civilian Office of Police Account- ability (COPA) have brought in Jamie Kalven and Craig Futterman to teach the new COPA investiga- tors. They are going to teach how to conduct investi- gations of police misconduct and police shootings. The money would be better spent having real investigators teach them investigations. How can they possibly teach COPA investigators how to conduct a fair and impartial investigation with their background? Futterman and Kalven have attacked our contract, discipline and the of- ficers’ bill of rights, as well as the conduct of our investi- gations, so how can we believe that we will get a fair inves- tigation from COPA? I have complete confidence that the new COPA will be as inept at their investigations as the Independent Police Review Authority (IPRA) and Office of Professional Standards (OPS) before them. I am sure that, as in the previous administrations, a normal person could read their reports and scratch their head and ask how they reached the conclusion they did. Make no mistake, this experiment will cost the taxpayers and the FOP a lot of money fighting their incompetence. If it walks like a duck
and quacks like a duck, it is a duck.
The Police Board
Rahm Emanuel just reappointed Lori Lightfoot to an- other term as Police Board president. Under her leader- ship to date, only one case has not resulted in an officer being terminated. This means we have to take these cases to court to get a fair verdict for our officers. We as a union must look long and hard at changing the contract to get separation cases before an arbitrator to have a fair and reasonable outcome.
Kim Foxx
The state’s attorney’s office under her leadership is not about the prosecution of criminals. She refuses to pros- ecute shoplifters and thieves, making our officers con- stantly call for an override only to have the case thrown out at the probable-cause hearing. She is putting us, and citizens, in harm’s way, because every time someone tries to arrest a shoplifter, there is a fight or chase. If she doesn’t want to prosecute the cases, she should go to Springfield and change the law. She really needs to look at the big pic- ture, because if we stop arresting criminals, Cook County will lay off court clerks, attorneys, public defenders and judges. That would save Toni Preckwinkle enough money that she could rescind the sugar tax.
your pension amount, which is cheap-
er than you are currently paying if you are working and maxed out 2.47 percent of your salary, which is $185.74 per pay
GREG BELLA
month for the family plan.
Until the next contract is voted on and ratified by the
City Council, the current contract and its benefits remain in force. That means if you retire prior to the ratification to take advantage of the 2 percent cost for retiree health care, that benefit will not change no matter what is agreed to in the new contract.
The Underwood case
The Underwood case is slowly winding down, and as is always the case when dealing with the City of Chicago, there is a back story. The City was ordered by Judge Cohen to have an insurance plan in place at a reasonable price for affected retirees, as well as the reconciliation for the years 2014 and 2015, on July 31, 2017. The bus was ready
RECORDING
Secretary
16 CHICAGO LODGE 7 ■ AUGUST 2017
God bless and stay safe. d