(a) Effective with the first pay period of 2004, the full amount of the statutorily required employee contributions to OPERS shall be withheld from the gross pay of each person within any of the classes established in division (b) herein and shall be “picked up” (assumed and paid to OPERS) by the City of Avon. This “pick up” by the City of Avon shall be designated as public employee contributions and shall be in lieu of contributions to OPERS by each person within any of the classes established in division (b) herein. No person subject to this “pick up” shall have the option of choosing to receive the statutorily required contribution to OPERS directly instead of having it “picked up” by the City of Avon or of being excluded from the “pick up”. The City of Avon shall, in reporting and making remittance to OPERS, report that the public employees contribution for each person subject to this “pick up” has been made as provided by the statute. Therefore, contributions, although designated as employee contributions, are employer-paid, and employees do not have the option to receive the contributions directly. All contributions are paid by the employer directly to the plan.
(b) The “pick up” by the City of Avon provided by this section shall apply to all persons that are employees of the City of Avon who are or become contributing members of OPERS.
(c) The City of Avon’s method of payment salary to employees who are participants in OPERS is hereby modified as follows, in order to provide for a salary reduction pick up of employee contributions to OPERS.
(d) The total salary for each employee shall be the salary otherwise payable under the City of Avon policies. Such total salary of each employee shall be payable by the City of Avon in two parts: (1) deferred salary and (2) cash salary. An employee’s deferred salary shall be equal to that percentage of that employee’s total salary which is required from time to time by OPERS to be paid as an employee contribution by that employee, and shall be paid by the City of Avon to OPERS on behalf of that employee as a “pick up” and in lieu of the OPERS employee contribution otherwise payable by that employee. An employee’s cash salary shall be equal to that employee’s total salary less the amount of the pick up for that employee, and shall be payable, subject to applicable payroll deductions, to that employee. The City of Avon shall compute and remit its employer contributions to OPERS based upon an employee’s total salary. The total combined expenditures of the City of Avon for such employees’ total salaries payable under applicable City of Avon policies and the “pick up” provisions of this section shall not be greater than the amounts it would have paid for those items had this provision not been in effect.
(e) The Finance Department is hereby authorized and directed to implement the provisions of this section to institute the “pick up” of the statutorily required contributions to OPERS for those persons reflected in division (b) herein so as to enable them to obtain the result in federal and state tax deferments.
(Ord. 61-90. Passed 5-29-90; Ord. 115-96. Passed 8-12-96; Ord. 251-03. Passed 11-24-03; Ord. 118-08. Passed 9-22-08.)