by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
Former sheriff and mayoral candidate Nat Glover is engaged in a year-long battle with the State Division of Retirement over $24,000 worth of back retirement pay he says he is due.
The DOR doesn’t dispute the fact Glover is due the money, but they say he shouldn’t get it in one retroactive payment.
An administrative law judge will rule on the dispute within the next month after hearing testimony here Thursday.
Glover and his attorney, Robert Klausner, faced off with DOR attorney Robert Button before various witnesses gathered in the conference room at the Police & Fire Pension Fund to argue the respective sides in a one-day hearing in front of Robert Cohen, director and chief administrative law judge for the State of Florida’s Division of Administrative Hearings.
The DOR recognizes that Glover did indeed retire on June 30, 2003 and is due approximately $160,000 in retirement benefits. However, he didn’t actually apply for those benefits until mid-April 2004. Klausner contends that Glover, with the help of Fire & Pension Fund Executive Director John Keane, sent many letters to the DOR starting in June 2002 informing them that he would be terminating his employment as sheriff on June 30, 2003.
At that time, he began seeking retirement estimates, another facet of the hearing.
The issue is a complicated matter that actually dates back to 1995 when Glover was first elected sheriff of Duval County — or Jacksonville, depending on who you ask. And, who he technically worked for at the time is one of the major sticking points in the case.
For years, the DOR didn’t recognize that Duval County and the City of Jacksonville are one in the same and that matters a great deal to the Florida Retirement System, the group that administers the retirement accounts of employees eligible to contribute to an FRS account.
Eventually, the state’s attorney general ruled that Glover, as a Constitutional officer, was eligible to enroll in the FRS. Now that he is retired and trying to collect his monthly payments, Glover and the DOR are in disagreement as to when those payments of $2,666 a month payments should have begun.
Glover got his first check in May 2004, but says he’s due another $24,000 now that covers July 2003 through April 2004.
“We believed he was terminating his employment but, since he didn’t apply for retirement, we assumed he wasn’t seeking his benefits,” said Button of a letter to DOR dated in mid-June, 2003. “If he intended to start getting his benefits in July of 2003, why didn’t he call after a month or two? He didn’t call our office until April 2004.”
Klausner says a state statute addresses this issue. He admits Glover may not have technically applied for his benefits at the time of his retirement, or even until April of 2004, but he is still due the $24,000 retroactively.
“They didn’t have to send the check until he actually applied, but nothing says he can’t start receiving his benefits,” said Klausner, of Klausner & Kaufman in Ft. Lauderdale.
Klausner also testified that there were administrative errors on the percentage of Glover’s benefits played a role in DOR
delaying payment.
“Because the Division of Retirement couldn’t give him the right estimate of benefits, they want him to forfeit nine months of benefits,” said Klausner. “The Division of Revenue hasn’t followed its own statute or rules and has acted improperly.”
Button said Glover will eventually be paid his full benefits but the DOR doesn’t believe he is owned anything retroactively because Glover simply didn’t apply for the benefits until April 2004, regardless how many letters he sent reminding DOR and FRS that he was terminating his employment June 30, 2003.
“In order to start collecting your retirement benefits, you have to do two things,” said Button. “First, you have to inform us that you plan to terminate employment, which Mr. Glover did. Two, you have to apply for the benefits and Mr. Glover didn’t apply until April of 2004. We have 800,000 people in the Florida Retirement System. There have to be standards for us to follow.”
Cohen said both sides have 10 days to prepare their orders and he will make his decision within 20 days of receiving both orders.