Wolf calls for bill to expand list of crimes that trigger pension loss
HARRISBURG — Gov. Tom Wolf on Thursday called on legislators to send him a bill that would expand the list of crimes that cause state employees to lose their pensions.
"Providing pensions to those who have committed crimes related to their elected offices is a betrayal of the public's trust," the Democratic governor said in a statement. "Public officials should be held to the highest possible standard and we should expect more out of them and our government."
His remarks came the same week the Philadelphia Inquirer and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette broke news that a state board voted to restore the more than $245,000 annual pension for longtime state Sen. Robert Mellow, D-Lackawanna, who in 2012 was convicted of federal corruption charges.
State law requires public employees, including legislators, to automatically forfeit their pensions if they are convicted of a state crime that falls into one of 23 categories or a federal crime that is "substantially the same as" those crimes. Mellow lost his pension but got it back after a board voted 6-5 that his federal crime didn't require him to lose the money.
Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2017/12/07/gov-tom-wolf-pensions-crime-pennsylvania-mellow-legislature-expand-list-crimes-loss-pension/stories/201712070207