Dan Tobben: St. Louis City’s Proposed Firefighter Pension Change May Be Illegal

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch has reported that St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay appears to be putting together a new proposal that may attempt to do away with the existing pension system for new firefighters joining the St. Louis City Fire Department. At a minimum, it would apparently reduce the benefits of any new firefighter joining the department. (Current and retired firefighters would remain in the current system.)

While details have not been released, Jeff Rainford, the mayor’s Chief of Staff, has started briefing the aldermanic council on the mayor’s intents. According to aldermen, Rainford has stated that if negotiations with the International Association of Fire Fighters Local 73 are not successful,

… the city would move to essentially “opt out” of the current system and start a new agency to govern firefighter retirement ….”

Slay has stalled a proposal already presented to the board for consideration that would save over $1 million a year, according to one alderman. The proposal was created through negotiations between the union and the City, with the drafting assistance of Dan Tobben and Cheryl Beebe Snell, attorneys for the Firemen’s Retirement System.

Joe Vaccaro, alderman in the city’s southwestern 23rd Ward, is frustrated that Slay has successfully stalled his bill, which he introduced this session to change firefighter disability benefits and save the city more than $1 million a year.

Slay asked Craig Schmid, alderman in south city’s 20th Ward and chair of the Public Employees committee, not to hear the bill until Slay’s plan is ready.

“He told me it doesn’t go far enough,” Vaccaro said of Slay. “Why not let my bill stand, save taxpayer money, and they can introduce their own legislation?”

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Firefighter Quits Joplin Pension Board Over Tobben’s Firefighter Disability Pension Case

The Joplin Globe has reported that a Joplin firefighter has resigned from the Police and Firemen’s Pension Fund board.

Tim Woodward, a battalion chief, stated that he resigned over the issue surrounding the lawsuit over disability benefits for  Tom Robertson, a former Joplin fire department driver-engineer. Robertson’s original disability benefits were reduced when recalculated by the pension board, and the board later declined to reverse their decision in an appeal by Robertson.

Robertson’s attorney, Dan Tobben, of St. Louis, discussed the issue with the board before a lawsuit was filed. He contended that those covered by the plan did not authorize changes to the plan that reduced benefits.

According to the Globe, Woodward conducted his own research regarding whether the pension board was advised that previous changes to the plan would reduce firefighter disability payments. Woodward said that the board had a chance during the board meeting, when presented with evidence he had uncovered during his own research, to reverse their previous decision regarding Robertson’s recalculated reduced disability benefit pay. When the board would not seize the opportunity to settle the lawsuit, Woodward resigned from the board.

“There’s sufficient evidence, and I presented sufficient evidence that shows there was never any authorized change to calculating disability benefits,” Woodward said. “There was never discussion by any previous boards to do that. There was never any ballot that indicated any such change. There was never a vote. And yet [Brian] Head maintained it was authorized to change that disability calculation.”

Brian Head, Joplin’s city attorney and adviser to the pension board under the city charter, disagrees that the board and the union membership were not properly informed.

For information regarding the Robertson lawsuit, click here.

Read more … Joplin Globe

Scott Mueller Comments on Appeal of Title Release Error Case

After the decision of the Missouri Court of Appeals Western District was handed down in Melson v. Traxler, Attorney Scott Mueller commented on the peculiar title release error case in the Columbia Daily Tribune.

In the case, Boone-Central Title Company failed to obtain a title release from the original sellers, Carl and Martha Traxler, when Darrel and Mellony Melson purchased their lot from Keith and Chastity Samuel. The Samuels had a seller-financing agreement with the Traxlers for a portion of the financing on a 94-acre tract of land against which the Traxlers held a lien. The other portion was financed by a bank.

When the Melsons purchased their lot, the title company requested and received a title release on the lot from the bank at the time of the sale. Unfortunately, the title company failed to request a title release from the Traxlers.

At the time of the sale of the lot to the Melsons, the Samuels were current on payments. After a few years, however, the Samuels fell behind on their payments on the land. The Traxlers decided to foreclose on the property. When it was discovered that the Melsons’ property was still attached to the original lien, the Traxlers foreclosed on the Melsons’ now fully-developed property.

Mueller represented the Melsons in circuit court. According to Mueller,

The appeals court took a stricter interpretation of the law, said Scott Mueller, a St. Louis attorney who represented the Melsons at the circuit level.

“They really consider the recording statutes as the gospel,” Mueller said.

Read the full story here.

Ruth Binger Shares Insight on Discovery of Lies After Hiring

St. Louis Small Business Monthly recently ran a “Board of Directors” column titled ”How do I handle an employee who lied in the interview process?” They asked Attorney Ruth Binger for her insight on how to deal with situation where an employee lied about his experience and education that was not uncovered until several years after hiring.

Read Ruth’s response here.

Glick’s “Using Engagement Letters to Protect from Liability and Market to Clients” Published in St. Louis Bar Journal

Thomas G. Glick, immediate past-president of the Bar Association of Metropolitan of St. Louis, was published in the Fall 2011 edition of the St. Louis Bar Journal. Read Glick’s thoughts on “Using Engagement Letters to Protect from Liability and Market to Clients.”

The effective use of an engagement letter policy is almost as good a hedge against professional liability as malpractice insurance. If you have chosen to carry malpractice insurance, your insurer would agree with my statements about the importance of creating and maintaining an engagement letter policy.

Engagement letters, when properly prepared, can protect you and your client, while at the same time provide marketing opportunities.

Read the full article … St. Louis Bar Journal 

Tobben Works With Firemen’s Retirement System and St. Louis City for New Solutions to Pension Issues

Under a new proposal being considered by the St. Louis Aldermanic Council, St. Louis City firefighters may have opportunities other than full disability due to injuries on the job. Retraining may become an option.

Dan Tobben has been working to help author the bill, according to stltoday.com.

Moreover, said Firemen’s Retirement System attorney Dan Tobben, whose office wrote much of  the bill, the education component will get disabled firefighters back into the  workforce.

“One of the big problems in America now is there are too many people getting  checks and not enough people working,” Tobben said. “This is a version of that.  We’re trying to get people to be back gainfully employed in the workforce.”

And while city leaders have consistently called the firefighter pension fund  a growing crisis, Tobben said he doesn’t believe it is as badly underfunded as  the city makes it out to be.

Read more … stltoday.com

Fewer Business Bankruptcies in St. Louis: Bankruptcy Attorney Tom DeWoskin’s Perspective

Tom DeWoskin, a seasoned bankruptcy attorney with over three decades of experience, weighs in on the dramatic decrease in business bankruptcy filings in the St. Louis area in 2011 over last year. In an article on 2nd quarter 2011 business backruptcies in the St. Louis Business Journal, DeWoskin commented on the state of bankruptcies in greater St. Louis.

“It seems to me that everybody in St. Louis who is going to fail has failed,” DeWoskin said. “You can only hang on for so long. After some period of time it’s going to kill you.”

But is that good news for the St. Louis area? Read more of DeWoskin’s thoughts …. the St. Louis Business Journal.

Read more on business bankruptcy in DeWoskin’s blog, “Protecting Against Preference Demands in a Bankruptcy Case.”

IP Attorney Jeff Michelman on the Public Employee’s Expectation of Privacy

In “The Supreme Court Speaks on Public Employee Electronic Privacy (But What Did the Court Say?)” in the St. Louis Bar Journal, intellectual property attorney Jeff Michelman gives employers and employess a lot to think about regarding privacy and technology in the workplace.

Co-authored by Stefan Knudsen, counsel with MFA, Inc., in Columbia, MO, this article takes a hard look at the 2010 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Ontario v. Quon, which involves public employees’ rights of privacy while using employer-owned technology. In this case, a police sergeant was disciplined for using his work pager for personal texts on the job, casuing him to go over his allowed usage.

In the discovery, it was determined his actual usage for work was minimal, and his personal texts contained inappropriate messages. His employer did not review all of his messages – but chose a representative two-month period for review. The sergeant sued claiming his 4th Amendment rights were violated. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the sergeant’s rights were not violated.

How do Michelman and Knudsen believe the ruling will affect employees’ right to privacy?

“It is crucial for employers to proactively notify employees—in writing—that they are to have no expectation of privacy on work-issued technology. Furthermore they need to enforce use policies of work-issued technologies.”

The article gives insight into what the decision may means, and what it does not mean, for employees and employers in respect to privacy on employer-owned electronic devices.

“Where a the employer needs to monitor, audit, search, or seize information from work-issued technology the employer must have a business-related purpose to do so, and the search must be limited to only that purpose. By the same token employees should attempt to keep personal information and data off of employer-owned technology resources.”

To read the full article, log into the St. Louis Bar Journal.

Michelman Gives Advice for Woman Business Enterprise (WBE)

Women business owners face challenges seeking national Woman Business Enterprise designation, maintaining state WBE designation, and learning how to obtain the designation with other government entities. Attorney Jeff Michelman offered this advice to Julie Steis, president of Mercury Communications and Cosntruction Inc.:

“She should make sure that the startup capital was borrowed on her own signature, and make sure it’s clear she is actually in control of the business – not acting as a figurehead.”

Read more … St. Louis Business Journal

Schmitt Gives Chamber’s Perspective on Positive Changes in Clayton Business District

Attorney Jeff Schmitt commented on the goals of the Clayton Chamber of Commerce to increase business in Clayton’s central business district.

“In moving Parties in the Park to Meramec Avenue this year, one focus and goal was to further increase and promote business to dining and retail establishments in the central business district by bringing the people to the streets,” said Jeff Schmitt, president of the Clayton Chamber of Commerce and principal at Danna McKitrick. “Based upon the first two parties this spring, it’s been a success.”

A graduate of the Chamber’s Leadership Clayton’s 2011 class, Schmitt also shared positive results of the class survey of young professionals’ opinions of  Clayton.

Read more … St. Louis Business Journal