More Furloughs for State Employees

More and more state employee are being furloughed. There's been an increase of 27 percent in just over a month. At the beginning of April, 31,838 employees were listed as taking days off without pay to help their agencies save money. Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, the Senate president, says he expects furloughs for many state agencies will continue into fiscal 2010, which begins July 1.

(Associated Press)

State work has benefits

Some long-term state employees are finding public service rather cushy. Georgia Bureau of Investigation Director Vernon Keenan has spent 38 years working for the state, and he’s earned some generous benefits.

He officially retired on March 1 and began to draw down on his pension. But Keenan still works full time.

“There’s no change in my status other than now I’m able to draw retirement benefits for six months out of the year,” Keenan says. “Everything else—the work day, the amount of work, the responsibilities—remains the same.”

Keenan says he formally retired because that was the only way he could designate how his survivors divided his benefits.

Last year, 11 other retirees received both paychecks and pensions from the state.

Georgia law permits qualified full-time employees to receive retirement benefits six months a year.

That means Keenan will receive a pension of $54, 354, in addition to his $143,420 salary.