Monday February 28th, ABC Newschannel 20′s Liz Foster got to see what a day in the life of a firefighter is like when she experienced Fire Ops 101 hosted by the AFFI in Springfield. See the news story here.
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At the present time, the Illinois Municipal League is attempting to advance legislation to redefine the Public Safety Employee Benefits Act meaning of “catastrophic injury”. Here’s a little history of how the Act came to be.
Enacted by the General Assembly in November 1997 over Governor Edgar’s veto, the PSEBA provides free health insurance to a public safety officer who is catastrophically injured or killed in the line of duty while engaging in fresh pursuit, investigating a criminal act, or responding to what is reasonably believed to be an emergency or an unlawful act perpetrated by another. The officer’s spouse and children until they reach the age of majority or the end of the year in which the child turns twenty-five if the child is either a dependent, part-time or full-time student are also entitled to free health insurance coverage under the Act. The health insurance must be provided by the employer for the remainder of the lives of the officer and spouse (or until the spouse remarries).
The Illinois Supreme Court issued its long- awaited decision in Krohe v. City of Bloomington, Case No. 94112 (March 20, 2003), in which the Court interpreted the term catastrophic injury as used in the Public Safety Employee Benefits Act (????PSEBA????). The Supreme Court interpreted the term catastrophic injury to mean any injury that qualifies an individual for a line-of-duty disability pension.
Since that time, municipal leaders have sought to limit or overturn the Act. Here is another example:
http://www.iml.org/page.cfm?key=8504
Attached is a summary from the Illinois Dept. of Insurance- Pension Division for how many firefighters across Illinois are currently receiving the PSEBA benefit. Less than 1% of all career firefighters are currently receiving the benefit.
What can you do? Call your legislators and let them know they need to protect the current PSEBA benefit for police and firefighters! Tell them to OPPOSE any efforts to undermine the current law.
Data based on information from Christina Roy, Dept of Insurance – Pension Division, as submitted to the AFFI on 4/21/2011 for the years 1952-2010.
- Since 1952, of the 188 Downstate Fire Pension Funds who have had at least 1 Line of Duty Disability, only 39 funds (20.7%) had over 10 disabilities (only 1 having more than 30), while 108 (57% of the funds) had less than 5 and 37 (19.6%) having only a single LOD Disability
- Peoria, having the highest amount of Line of Duty Disabilities since 1952 (36 LOD-Disabilities), had 16 of those between 1990 and 1996 (a six year window) but only 17 in the 13 years (1997-2009) that followed.
- In 1996 there were 11,263 participants in the Downstate Fire Pension System and 48 new Line of Duty Disabilities filed – 0.43% of the total participants
- In 2009 there were 17,814 participants and 35 new LOD Disabilities – 0.20% of total participants
- In 2009 there were 30 new LOD Disabilities filed…in 1990 there was also 30 new LOD Disabilities filed.
- In 2006 there were 51 new LOD Disabilities filed…in 1993 there was also 51 new LOD Disabilities filed.
- The last 4 years prior to 1997, the AVERAGE LOD Disability/Year was 44.25…in the years that followed, only in 5 of the 13 years did the number of LOD Disabilities surpass 44.25/year.
- The last 4 years prior to 1997, the HIGHEST LOD Disability/Year was 51 (1993)…only once (2008, 53) in the years that followed did the number of LOD Disabilities surpass 51/year.
Here is a link to a recent ruling here in Illinois.
http://www.state.il.us/court/Opinions/SupremeCourt/2012/110012.pdf
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