TIFTON — County commissioners hope to provide workers of the county with more incentive to continue employment through recent amendments to their defined benefit plan.

During their Dec. 9 meeting, members of the county board of commissioners moved to establish continued retirement benefits through the plan for county employees, allowing them to receive those benefits even after they had reached the retirement period, but had decided to continue working for the county.

The original plan only provided benefits once the employee had reached retirement after thirty years of working with the county, but did not allow them to receive funding if they remained a county employee.

County manager Jim Carter noted this issue at the Dec. 3 county commission meeting, as it disincentivized retiring employees from continuing work and created a risk for those that did remain with the county, as their spouse could not benefit from further retirement funding should the worker do so and pass away.

He asserted the change would draw in more experienced workers or convince their existing seasoned employees to remain on call.

In the following meeting, he noted that several surrounding counties had also implemented the program.

Commissioner Melissa Hughes expressed her appreciation for the revisions, grateful that county staff had taken the initiative to look out for their veteran employees.

The updated program is set to go into effect January 1, and will have a sunset provision of five years, at which point the commissioners will review its effectiveness and further discuss their next move regarding the policy.