West St. Paul Benefit Summary

If you come to work for West St. Paul, you will be joining a team of people dedicated to promoting and preserving the community of West St. Paul’s excellence through ethical, responsive, efficient and innovative delivery of services. The City’s goal in delivering these services is to provide you with a challenging job, opportunities, and recognition for your contributions. It is only in this kind of culture, where you can grow, that the City will also grow.

The City provides a comprehensive benefits program for eligible employees. The following is a summary and does not include all benefits.

Time Off

Paid Time-Off (PTO) - All new general services employees accrue P.T.O. New employees accrue almost three and a half weeks (136 hours) each year for the first four years. The amount per year increases several times over one’s career to a maximum of over six weeks per year at 20 years of service.

Vacation and Sick Leave – For Police Officers and PW and Park maintenance staff, employees will accrue vacation and sick leave. Sick leave is accrued at 12 days per year and new employees accrue two weeks of vacation.  The amount of vacation per year increases several times over one’s career to a maximum of five weeks per year at 20 years of service.

Holidays

The City provides 11 paid holidays on designated days plus one floating holiday including:

New Year’s Day, President’s Day, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Veteran’s Day, Thanksgiving, the Day after Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. 

Insurance

Medical Insurance - The City provides medical insurance through Blue Cross and Blue Shield. There are two plans to choose from and three possible tiers (Single, Single plus 1 and family coverage).

Employees who are scheduled to work at least 30 hours per week are eligible to participate in the health insurance plan. Those who work 32 hours or more will be considered full-time for purposes of insurance coverage and City contributions.

The first plan has a $500/$1,000 deductible with 80% coverage upon meeting the deductible. The second plan has a $2000/$4000 deductible with 100% coverage upon meeting the deductible. The City also makes a significant contribution to a VEBA/H.S.A. for the second plan to assist with the cost of the deductible.  Employees may contribute pre-tax money into their HSA account.

Life Insurance

We provide a $25,000 term life insurance benefit for all employees who work 32 or more hours per week at no cost to them and a $10,000 benefit for employees working 30-32 hours at no cost. We also offer employees the option to purchase supplemental and spousal insurance at very reasonable costs. Child life insurance is $1.11 per month per family and provides $10,000 coverage per covered child.

Long-Term Disability

We provide a long-term disability benefit to our employees who work at least 30 hours per week at no cost to them. It provides a 60% benefit in case of a disabling illness or injury. This benefit begins at 90 days and includes a 70% all source cap. That means if you are receiving other payments (from worker’s compensation, PERA or Social Security disability for example) you will be able to receive a maximum of 70% of your take home pay. Benefits paid are not taxed.  

We also offer a variety of voluntary employee-paid insurance benefits at reduced group rates to employees who work at least 20 hours per week in an ongoing position. They include:

Dental                   Short-term Disability              Vision (prescription eye wear and contacts)

Retirement Plans

PERA - We participate in the Public Employees Retirement Association for employees’ pensions. The contributions to PERA are made by both the City and employee. Participation in this plan is mandatory by State law but it is a very good pension plan.

457 Plans – (Similar to a 401k, but better) The City provides a deferred compensation program for additional retirement savings. Contributions to this 457 program are made on a pre-tax basis by the employee.  There are currently two plans and employees may contribute to either, or both, plans.  The plans are through the State of Minnesota and ICMA.

Post-Employment Health Plans

We have a plan for each employee group that allows for severance pay and ongoing contributions to go into an account for medical and LTC premiums and other medical expenses. The money is tax-free.

Wellness

We sponsor a variety of wellness activities and provide regular email updates to encourage employees to improve their health and fitness.