Newsom Vetoes AB 1383: Safety Retirement Age Stays at 57 for Post-2013 California Officers

“This is an era of California history I do not want to repeat.” Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote that line about the years before the 2012 pension reform, in a two-page message returning Assembly Bill 1383 unsigned on September 20 [1]. The bill would have let police officers, deputies and firefighters hired since 2013 reach full retirement benefits at 55 instead of 57. For every public safety union in the state that bargains under the Public Employees’ Pension Reform Act, PEPRA, the answer for now is no.

What Newsom rejected

AB 1383, by Assemblymember Tina McKinnor (D-Inglewood), was one of 24 bills the governor vetoed in his September 20 update [2]. The Department of Finance’s analysis of the July 1 version lays out what it did [3]:

• Lowered the benefit age from 57 to 55 for the three existing PEPRA safety formulas, 2% at 57, 2.5% at 57 and 2.7% at 57.
• Created a fourth formula, 3% at 55, capped at 90% of compensation and available only through bargaining.
• Reset the pensionable compensation cap from the 2013 Social Security base to the 2027 base, $249,075 for safety members, and raised the multiplier for members outside Social Security from 120% to 135%.
• Applied the changes to service on or after January 1, 2027, leaving the current formulas in place for service from 2013 through 2026.

The bill passed the Senate 33-0 and the Assembly 69-2, CalMatters reported [4]. The veto message does not dispute the policy goal. It says the measure “would partially reverse some of PEPRA’s reforms and significantly increase state and local government costs” [1]. It adds a second objection: by “widening the retirement benefit gap between safety members and non-safety members,” the bill “invites future changes that would expose our retirement system to additional risk” [1].

Then the history. Newsom wrote that he still recalls, before PEPRA passed in 2012, “the alarming forecasts, the fierce criticism of public employees, and the growing pressure to eliminate defined benefit plans altogether” [1]. He closed: “I fear that undoing PEPRA’s reforms, even partially, risks us doing exactly that” [1].

What the age-57 rule means for a deputy hired in 2015

Nothing changes on payday. The veto keeps the status quo, and the status quo is the point of contention.

PEPRA raised the safety retirement age from 50 to 57 and cut the top formula from 3% to 2.7% per year of service, CalMatters noted [4]. That split the workforce in two. An officer hired in 2011 and one hired in 2014 can work the same shift, in the same car, and retire under different rules.

The size of the gap is easy to see. Twenty-five years at 2.7% comes to 67.5% of final compensation; 25 years at 3% would have been 75%, by this column’s count. Under AB 1383, the 3% figure would only have applied where an employer agreed to it at the table [3]. The age change from 57 to 55 would have applied to every PEPRA safety member [3].

For agencies, the cost side is the part that would have reached the budget. CalPERS estimated, according to Finance, that the mandatory provisions alone would raise the present value of future benefits by $4.8 billion and first-year employer normal cost contributions by $282 million across its system [3]. If the 3% at 55 tier were adopted, the estimate adds $353 million a year in normal cost and $3.4 billion in future benefits [3]. For the California Highway Patrol, the bargainable tier alone would have meant a 1.14% increase in normal cost [3].

Counties outside CalPERS faced their own math. The State Association of County Retirement Systems estimated that a single medium-sized county could see more than $700 million added to future benefits over 30 years, roughly $20 million a year in added employer contributions to its safety plan [3]. Finance wrote that “several counties have indicated that they cannot absorb cost increases” [3].

Employees would have paid too. Under PEPRA’s 50/50 split of normal cost, Finance expected member contribution rates to rise once the plan’s normal cost moved by more than 1% of payroll [3].

Where the unions and the local governments stand

The Peace Officers Research Association of California, which backed the bill, framed it as a recruiting and retention measure. Its March fact sheet said agencies “report sustained vacancies, lateral losses to competing jurisdictions, and surging resignation rates,” and that “two officers doing the same challenging and dangerous job today retire under dramatically different benefit formulas based solely on their hire date” [6]. It argued that injury and disability rates rise with age in safety work, so earlier eligibility “can reduce costly workers’ compensation claims and disability retirements” [6]. PORAC put the cost of the two mandatory provisions at $151.5 million a year statewide, against $26.5 billion in employer PEPRA savings CalPERS forecast for 2023 through 2033 [6].

The firefighters said the same thing in fewer words. “AB 1383 gives us something important: Two more years with our families,” California Professional Firefighters President Darrell Roberts said at a rally before the veto, according to CalMatters [4]. Afterward he said the union was “deeply disappointed” [4].

The counties disputed the premise. CSAC Senior Legislative Advocate Eric Lawyer argued in a September 10 Q&A that counties see no significant recruitment and retention problem large enough to justify a permanent new expense, at a time when they face layoffs and fiscal uncertainty [5]. CSAC put the CalPERS cost at about $4 billion for the state and its member cities and counties over the coming decades, or $7.4 billion if every member agency adopted 3% at 55, and said those estimates likely run low because they rest on two-year-old data [5].

La Verne City Manager Ken Domer called the bill “the greatest long-term financial threat to the sustainability of cities in years,” CalMatters reported, and a coalition of cities, counties and special districts praised the veto, saying it is “more important than ever for state leaders to help control costs” [4].

Finance added a point neither side led with. Because the higher pay cap and normal cost apply across a whole bargaining unit, it wrote, “lower compensated individuals would subsidize the new benefits accruing to higher compensation members within the same unit” [3]. It also noted the Public Employees’ Retirement Fund was 79% funded as of June 30, 2025 [3].

Other officer bills on the same list

The same September 20 update included a veto of AB 2337, a bill by Assemblymember Lackey on theft by peace officers [2]. Both vetoes came 10 days before the governor’s September 30 deadline on the bills still before him [5].

What I’m watching

September 30. The signing deadline [5]. Whatever is still on the governor’s desk is decided by then, and this column will report what reaches police and prosecutors.

The 2027 version. Roberts wrote to members, “this fight is not over,” and Assemblymember Stephanie Nguyen (D-Elk Grove) said at the earlier rally that the bill was “just the beginning” [4]. Any new bill would have to answer the veto message’s two objections: cost, and the gap between safety and non-safety members [1].