Part-time job, full-time benefits: County, magistrates clash over health coverage

Should local magistrate judges who may work only a handful of hours a week be entitled to full, taxpayer-funded medical benefits?

Beaufort County administration leaders say they should not, citing the fact that no other part-time county employees receive health insurance. The judges take the opposite position.

The sides squared off earlier this week, each arguing their points before Beaufort County Council, which has been tapped to mediate the dispute.

The county has 16 magistrate judges — 13 of whom are part-time — who hear a total of about 30,000 civil and criminal cases in Beaufort County each year, Chief Magistrate Lawrence McElynn said earlier this week.

“The magistrate court is operating soundly,” he said, and that operation depends on the “skill, hard work and dedication of judges.”

Those judges deserve to retain their medical benefits, McElynn said.

Benefits for the 13 part-time judges cost the county more than $50,000 per year.

McElynn estimates at least $1 million in fines, fee and assessments are collected annually from magistrate rulings, which more than “offsets the cost of court operations.”

Beaufort County administrator Gary Kubic said Wednesday that the judges — some of whom work eight hours a week or less — are asking for preferential treatment not provided to county’s other part-timers.

“It’s an issue of equity,” he said.

“Should the (health insure) benefit be applied to the other part-time employees?” he asked rhetorically.

In an ideal world, all employees would be given medical benefits. But that isn’t possible from an budgetary perspective, he said.

Deputy county administrator Josh Gruber acknowledged earlier this week that it must “be hard (for the judges) not to view this as a personal attack.”

The magistrates “provide a very valuable service,” he said. “... The issue, however … is that the county has over 150 people who also work part-time to provide very valuable services.”

Beaufort County Council members plan to take the next few weeks to consider the arguments and issue a ruling in the near future.

This isn’t the first time county leaders and magistrates have bumped heads in recent years.

Last year, the judges pushed for a 2-percent pay increase — in addition to the 3 percent cost-of-living adjustment given to them and all county employees. County leaders balked, claiming the magistrates were only entitled to one of the raises.

An arbitrator, retired S.C. Court of Appeals Judge Danny Pieper, ruled last March in favor of the county.

The current terms for the judges — who are nominated and appointed by state lawmakers — expire in April 2018.

Kubic said regardless of how the council rules on the medical benefits issue, he hopes the local legislative delegation opts to forgo part-time judges when a new crop of magistrates is appointed next year.

“If you remove these part-time appointments, then the issue is over,” he said.

This story was originally published May 10, 2017 at 1:33 PM with the headline "Part-time job, full-time benefits: County, magistrates clash over health coverage."