Posts Tagged: retirement
UC seeks comment on proposed phased retirement program
Dear Colleagues,
The University of California is seeking comments on its proposed Phased Retirement Program that would help employees who are 55 or older transition into retirement. Senior Management Group members and academics would not be eligible for this program. The program would be subject to collective bargaining for represented employees.
UC wants to offer this program as an optional tool that locations and organizational units may choose to provide to eligible career staff employees as an opportunity to transition into early retirement. The program would allow staff members to reduce their work hours by at least 10 percent a year over a fixed period, from 120 days up to three years, before retiring. In exchange, employees will receive certain specified advantages, such as vacation and sick leave based on the rate of accrual prior to participating in the Program, and a lump sum cash incentive upon retirement that would be equal to half the amount of the reduction in time.
Under the proposal, if you have at least five years of service credit and work at least 60 percent time, you would be eligible. You could participate for as little as 120 days to as much as three years, reducing your appointment by at least 10 percent annually if you reduce time multiple years. You would retire when you finish the program and receive the incentive payment within 30 days of retirement.
For example, if you’re a full-time employee earning $50,000 a year and you reduce your work hours by 10 percent, your annual salary would be $45,000 and your appointment rate would be 90 percent. Your one-time incentive payment would be $2,500 upon retirement, which is half the amount you would have earned otherwise.
The proposed voluntary Phased Retirement Program document and an informative FAQ are posted at http://atyourservice.ucop.edu/employees/
policies_employee_labor_relations/proposed_policies/index.html under “Proposed Programs.”
As part of the normal policy review process, employees are invited to comment. Please send your comments on the proposed program to me at lmmanton@ucdavis.edu by Monday, September 26.
Sincerely,
Linda Marie Manton
Executive Director for Staff Personnel
View or leave comments for the Executive Working Group
This announcement is also posted and archived on the ANR Update pages.
Newspapers cover retiring advisors
The Imperial Valley Press ran a feature on 4-H advisor Mary Harmon, who retired after 16 years in that position on two separate occasions (1978-1990, 2007-2011). Harmon has been involved in 4-H throughout her life as a participant, advisor and volunteer.
Setting a melancholy tone for the Hollister Freelance article, Breen noted that long-time UCCE advisors are retiring around California, where the number of county-based advisors has dropped from 400 in the 1980s to about 180 today.
Wednesday was the last day for 12 UC Cooperative Extension 4-H, farm, and nutrition, family and consumer sciences advisors. Some advisors will be replaced. In April, Dan Dooley, vice president of UC Agriculture and Natural Resources, announced that five academic positions were approved for recruitment. The positions are:
- Delta crops resource management advisor - San Joaquin, Sacramento, Solano, Yolo and Contra Costa counties
- Livestock, range and natural resources advisor - Kern, Tulare and Kings counties
- 4-H youth development advisor – Central Sierra Multi-county Partnership - El Dorado, Amador, Calaveras and Tuolumne counties
- Urban integrated pest management advisor - Bay Area - Contra Costa, Alameda, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties
- Youth, families and communities advisor - Humboldt, Del Norte, Lake and Mendocino counties
“I really strongly believe that adults have the responsibility to give back to their community and they can do it through 4-H and heading (its various) programs,” Harmon was quoted.
The Hollister Freelance article said Coates was the expert farmers from around the Central Coast would call with questions about the walnut husk fly or black line disease in walnuts. His research has ranged from methods to reduce the amount of pesticides to ways to control pests that can devastate crops.
Coates, like many of his retired UCCE advisor colleagues, won't turn his back on his life's work during retirement. He plans to update a publication on home fruit gardening in San Benito County, write a report on the county's climate and continue three major research projects – spotted wing drosophila, walnut husk fly and blackline-resistant walnut varieties.
“I would like to continue to develop new research and assist local growers as my time allows," Coates said.
Harmon also won't leave 4-H behind. She plans to volunteer in leadership development during her retirement.
“(4-H) really is part of how I define myself. It’s been a great job,” Harmon was quoted.
Visalia Times-Delta features retiring advisor
In a feature story printed on her last day at work before retiring, UC Cooperative Extension 4-H advisor for Tulare County Carla Sousa said it wasn't until her retirement party last Saturday that she could pinpoint the greatest achievement of her 33-year 4-H career.Sousa told Visalia Times-Delta reporter Victor Garcia that many current and former 4-H members approached her at the party to say what a positive impression she'd made on their lives.
"For them to thank [me] for what [I] did for them, that would be my greatest accomplishment," Sousa was quoted.
According to the article, Sousa said her attitude about 4-H has changed over the years along with the organization. She values most the "life skills" — including communication and teamwork — that participants come away with.
"At first I thought the subject matter was [most] important, but realized that it's the life skills they get out of it that's important," Sousa was quoted.
Read more about Sousa's career in a retirement release on the UC ANR news website.
Sousamug
Fred Swanson's retirement covered on ABC 30 news
Nearly 200 people gathered at the UC Kearney Research and Extension Center yesterday to send off retiring director Fred Swanson. The event was covered by ABC 30 Action News, the No. 1 broadcast news outlet in Fresno.
Reporter Dale Yurong interviewed Swanson in front of the center's two-story office, laboratory and meeting room complex, one of many expansions at the center that Swanson oversaw during his 26-year tenure at the helm.
"The idea was to put Kearney on the map and really develop this research center into a world-class facility," Swanson said on camera.
Somehow, Yurong was able to add video of a young Swanson to his two-minute report. It looks to me the man in the black-rimmed glasses in the same clip is Kearney-based entomologist Charlie Summers, though Yurong mentioned the name of retired UC viticulture academic Pete Christensen during his brief appearance. (It may be Christensen in the next clip walking a vineyard with Swanson.)
Swanson and Christensen were viticulture farm advisors in the Fresno County UC Cooperative Extension office in the 1970s.
"That was the heyday of the grape boom. Many of these growers had never grown grapes and not really been exposed to viticulture and so it was a challenging period of time, but it was an exciting period of time," Swanson said.
Attending the luncheon yesterday were many of Swanson's colleagues, area farmers, dignitaries from the cities of Reedley and Parlier, representatives of state and federal legislators, a member of the Fresno County Board of Supervisors and the Fresno County sherriff, Margaret Mims.
When Sheriff Mims was introduced, UC IPM advisor Walt Bentley wondered aloud, "Is she looking for Fred?"
Fred Swanson.
It's a sad day for UC
In the last month or so, I interviewed four retiring UC academics about their education, their beginnings with UC, their accomplishments (there were many) and their retirement plans. In all, the quartet represent 126 years of service to the California agricultural industry. All of them retire today. You can read all about the retirees by going to the news releases, linked to their names. Here, I'll share the fun part: their retirement plans.
Fred Swanson, director, UC Kearney Research and Extension Center
Swanson and his wife Cheryl will stay in their new Kingsburg home during retirement, but they have many plans for travel and recreation. The Swansons will spend more time at their cabin at Huntington Lake, play more golf at the Kings River Golf and Country Club and maintain a busy schedule of fishing and hunting trips. Swanson already has plans for two more fishing trips this year in Alaska, pheasant hunting in South Dakota, duck hunting in Tulelake, dove hunting in Kingsburg and a first-time elk hunting trip in Colorado. “Life is really good!” Swanson said.
Mick Canevari, director, UC Cooperative Extension in San Joaquin County
Canevari said he and his wife will continue to operate her specialty clothing store in Stockton and he will manage the family farm. An avid outdoorsman, Canevari already has plans for a two-week hunting trip in Canada this summer, and the local fishing and hunting he has enjoyed all his life will continue, but with greater frequency. “The one thing that will change is that now I won’t have to come home on Sundays,” Canevari said.
(The Stockton Record ran a story on Canevari over the weekend titled "Outstanding in his field.")
Don Lancaster, director, UC Cooperative Extension in Modoc County
Lancaster said retirement will provide more time for hunting and fishing, pastimes he has enjoyed going back to his days in Beegum, Calif., when venison and trout were frequently on the family dinner table. Today, Lancaster is already fishing at a favorite resort in British Columbia, Canada.
Mario Moratorio, farm advisor, UC Cooperative Extension in Yolo and Solano counties
Moratorio has plans to visit his undergraduate alma mater in Uruguay in July to present a seminar on the UC agricultural extension system. “The dean of the college is a close friend of mine,” Moratorio said. “He has been trying to develop an extension system like ours in Uruguay and would like to have another voice carrying his message.” Moratorio’s home base will remain the Solano County community of Cordelia Village, where he also plans to support local farmers during his retirement by connecting them with low-income residents in order to enhance their access to fresh fruits and vegetables.