BERKELEY – A crowd of supporters reported for duty at a Township Council meeting to witness four officers being promoted.
Capt. Brian Woermer, Lt. Timothy Pizzella, Sgt. Alexander Houle, and Sgt. Jonathan Mulvihill were sworn in by Mayor John Bacchione. The line of blue filling the front of the hall made it difficult to fit them all in one photo.
Chief Kevin Santucci thanked the officers who came out to make it a positive experience.
“We deal with a lot of negativity in our jobs,” Santucci said. “It makes our jobs a lot easier to have the support of the mayor and council, the community and our fellow officers.”
In other police news, the Township Council supported State Assembly bill A-5175. This bill reinstates automatic cost-of-living adjustments for annual pension, ordinary disability pension, or accidental disability pension retirement benefits for certain members of the Police and Firemen’s Retirement System. To qualify, they must have been retired and receiving retirement benefits for a minimum of ten years.
According to the bill statement, these COLA increases are to help first responders who retired back when their pay was much less than the going rate; their pension stays the same but inflation goes up. There are limitations on this bill, such as it doesn’t provide for retroactive COLAs.
Many of Berkeley’s officers came out to show their support of four cops who were getting promoted at a recent Township Council meeting. (Photo by Chris Lundy)
Council members Michael Signorile and Thomas Grosse, both retired police officers, spoke in favor of the bill while noting that it doesn’t apply to either of them.
Signorile said these first responders have not had a cost-of-living increase since 2008. “A lot of them are not able to get Social Security until this year.”
The officers impacted by this bill are those who were injured by a weapon, Grosse said. “There’s only a modicum of officers that meet the criteria.”
The bill stated that due to the costs of increasing pensions, only specific officers and firefighters were included. The bill noted that all retired officers and firefighters deserve the increase but because of the cost, this bill addresses those with the greatest need.
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