McMeekin challenges candidates to decline health care benefits

MARGATE – Even before the first debate, there are gauntlets being thrown down in Margate.
City commission candidate Edwin McMeekin issued a statement Wednesday, March 21 saying that when he is elected to the commission he will decline to accept the health care package offered, and he is challenging the other candidates to join him.
“I ask that the candidates lead by example, as one of the leading expenses in the city budget is health care cost,” the statement read.
McMeekin said that by declining the health care benefit package, valued at around $20,000, the commissioners would be setting an example for when the time comes for them to ask city employees to contribute to their own health care packages.
“They may understand that zero contributions toward health are a thing of the past,” he said.
He said that an employee contribution of 10 percent toward health care could amount to a savings of nearly a quarter of a million dollars a year, nearly 1 cent off the tax rate.
He proposed that any new part-time hires not be given the health care package.
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