Allentown’s police union has taken City Council to court, accusing it of illegally blocking a retirement program that Mayor Matt Tuerk already agreed to months ago. Queen City Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 10 filed a complaint in Lehigh County Court on Oct. 16 against the council and its seven members, alleging the body has overstepped its authority and impeded the union’s collective-bargaining rights by refusing to approve a Deferred Retirement Option Plan, known as DROP.
What the Lawsuit Claims
According to Lehigh Valley Public Media, the union argues council breached a collective-bargaining agreement by failing to approve Tuerk’s decision, and that council’s only role in such agreements is to enact ordinances carrying out terms already negotiated. The lawsuit states that council has no authority to “reopen, renegotiate, nullify or obstruct” agreements already reached between the union and the mayor. The suit asks a Lehigh County judge to force council to approve DROP, arguing the memorandum of understanding between the union and Tuerk is legally binding, as reported by The Morning Call.
Tuerk and the union entered their memorandum of understanding in February, agreeing to implement DROP in the union’s next collective-bargaining agreement, set to take effect in 2027. The program would let eligible officers defer retirement by up to five years while collecting pension payments on top of their regular salary, with those payments earmarked into a lump sum paid out when they fully retire. Allentown officers become eligible for pension benefits after 20 years of service to the city.
Council Cites Unanswered Cost Questions
Council has not moved forward. The Morning Call reports that on June 11, council debated and ultimately delayed a vote to amend the law adding the DROP program, with members saying they lacked the detailed cost projections needed to make a decision, a concern also detailed by Citizen Portal in its report on the per-officer reimbursement debate. Council members met again with city leaders and union officials in September but took no action, citing lingering questions about DROP’s long-term costs. Councilwoman Candida Affa said at the time that without reliable figures to compare, it was difficult for council to make a decision, and council said it wanted to wait for an independent five-year financial analysis of the city’s outlook before voting.
Council President Santo Napoli and Vice President Cynthia Mota said in an emailed statement that council’s authority includes approving or rejecting any changes to Allentown employee collective-bargaining agreements, and that the body will vigorously defend its legislative authority and responsibility for overseeing the city’s financial commitments. Napoli said council wants to understand the city’s financial outlook before making decisions with potential budget impacts on residents, while the two council leaders said they have a right and obligation to protect taxpayers’ long-term financial interests. Council was expected to vote at its regular Wednesday meeting on retaining lawyer David Hackett to defend against the lawsuit.
Cost Estimates Diverge
The cost debate centers on an analysis from the auditing firm Maher & Duessel, which found DROP could require millions of dollars more in city pension contributions starting in 2028. Reports differ on exactly how to frame that cost: The Morning Call’s coverage of the lawsuit describes the firm’s estimate as a $1.1 million-to-$2.8 million increase in Allentown’s state-mandated pension contribution in the program’s first year, rising to as much as $3.5 million annually after five years, while the outlet’s earlier June report described the same $1.1 million-to-$2.8 million range as an annual figure rather than a first-year one. Separately, projections cited in the dossier show added annual DROP costs of $1.1 million from 2028 through 2031 under current retirement trends, with costs potentially reaching $3.5 million in 2031 if all eligible officers entered the program as soon as they qualified.
An independent five-year financial analysis presented Oct. 28 found Allentown’s 2027 budget balanced but projected annual deficits beginning in 2028 under current assumptions, according to Citizen Portal. The auditor warned that losing stormwater-fee revenue or adopting the police DROP program could accelerate that shortfall. Maher & Duessel’s analysis separately projected the city’s general fund could need to replace more than $5 million in stormwater fees beginning in 2028, a risk tied to a Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling that could exempt government- and nonprofit-owned properties from those fees since stormwater charges are treated as a tax rather than a service charge. The firm said establishing DROP alongside losing stormwater revenue could rapidly drain the city’s financial reserves without significant intervention, and officials could ultimately need to weigh spending cuts and additional tax increases.
Staffing Pressure Behind the Push
Behind the legal fight is a staffing concern the union says is urgent. The lawsuit states that many Allentown officers have agreed to keep working if the city establishes DROP, and Police Chief Charles Roca has said the department faces roughly 15 imminent retirements out of about 210 officers, representing roughly 7% of the force. Christopher Matthews has said DROP would give the department time to expand recruiting before a wave of departures, and urged council to pass the amendments and approve the program promptly so officers could decide before year-end whether to enroll.
The dispute is unfolding as council reviews Tuerk’s proposed 2027 budget, opened for review last month, which includes a proposed 3.81% property tax increase. That follows a 3.96% increase Tuerk imposed for 2026, the city’s first property tax hike in seven years. A police-pension ordinance update bill meant to authorize DROP was introduced in June 2026, but council has not adopted the legislative changes needed for the program to take effect next year when the union’s new contract begins, according to the Allentown Legistar legislative record describing Bill 46, which would add a limited deferred retirement option plan to the police pension fund ordinance.
A Cautionary Comparison From Philadelphia
Allentown isn’t the first Pennsylvania city to wrestle with DROP’s costs. A 2010 study by the Boston College Center for Retirement Research examined Philadelphia’s longer-running version of the program, in which employees could keep working for up to four years while their monthly pension benefit accrued in a tax-deferred, interest-bearing account. That study estimated Philadelphia’s DROP delayed retirement by an average of 1.25 years for municipal employees, though the effect for firefighters and police officers was smaller, between two months and one year, and it found the program had cost the city around $258 million through the end of 2009, concluding that no plausible combination of assumptions made the plan cost-neutral to the pension system. The researchers’ findings apply specifically to Philadelphia’s program and were not presented as a forecast for Allentown’s proposed plan.
