Early Retirement

Anthony F. Barbieri, managing editor of The Sun, said yesterday that he would retire after a 34-year career at the paper. Barbieri, who expects to leave at the end of August, said he hopes to spend the last portion of his career teaching or giving back to journalism. "This is the right time to leave," said Barbieri, 57. "It is sort of time to turn a page." Timothy A. Franklin, who was named editor of The Sun in January, said he would begin a search for a managing editor immediately. "I am determined to find the best person in the nation for the job, a superb journalist who is completely dedicated to excellence and building on the great traditions of this great newspaper," Franklin said in a memo to the staff.

BY LATE SATURDAY, some 2,600 state workers are expected to have signed up for an early-retirement package approved by the General Assembly in the spring. The idea is to save money, but an unintended result could be a dilution in the quality of services at state agencies.Take, for instance, the General Assembly's own support operation. The two mainstays of those offices, William S. Ratchford and F. Carvel Payne, are taking the early-retirement offer, leaving a yawning knowledge gap that will be difficult to fill.

Just days after reversing its plan to split into two independent businesses, Constellation Energy Group Inc. offered early retirement packages to 130 employees this week. Additional workers will be trimmed in January from Baltimore Gas and Electric Co., according to company officials. They said there is no target for how many positions need to be cut. It was also unclear how much money Constellation could save through the voluntary buyouts. The buyouts come shortly after Constellation announced Oct. 26 that it had abandoned its plan to separate the company into two holding companies, each with its own management and staff.

Hoping to slash the Fire Department's upper management by half, Baltimore County Executive C. A. Dutch Ruppersberger is offering an early retirement package he hopes will free up $825,000 a year for additional emergency medical services. Administration officials say the department's top ranks have been bloated for years. They want to reduce the number of battalion chiefs from 30 to 15, and cut the number of deputy chiefs from five to two. To achieve those goals, they are dangling a relatively modest package of incentives: allowing any battalion or deputy chief with at least 20 years of service to retire and collect benefits immediately if they are younger than 55; increasing annual retirement payments by about 3 percent by doubling accrued sick time that can be added to years of service; and offering better health insurance.

Just as businesses are patting themselves on the back for having gotten their Y2K computer problems under control, a new challenge is on the horizon. In 2001, the first of the 76 million-member baby-boom generation will reach the early retirement age of 55. Employers could face a huge talent drain as the new century begins and the work force ages. "This is going to be one of the primary influences on the economy over the next decade," said Dennis Coleman, a human resources consultant for PricewaterhouseCoopers in New Jersey.

In a move designed to gird Baltimore County's government against layoffs, the County Council last night approved a plan to nudge 150 or more employees into early retirement. Officials hope to shrink the payroll by $5 mil Executive C. A. Dutch Ruppersberger III said of the plan, which was approved unanimously by the council.Council Chairman Vincent J. Gardina, a Perry Hall Democrat, praised the administration for seeking the retirement incentives instead of waiting for possible layoffs. "This appears to be a fairly compassionate effort," he said as he prepared to vote.

Their sense of security shattered by past layoffs and current budget woes, Baltimore County employees have rushed to take an early retirement offer.The Ruppersberger administration set a goal of 150 workers, but by yesterday's deadline, 235 had signed up for the program, designed to save the county millions of dollars.That's a relief for county officials, who learned this week that their share of fourth-quarter state income tax revenue was down 4.4 percent from last year -- a $2 million loss.

Delta offers early retirementDelta Air Lines, in the latest of several moves to rebound from a prolonged financial slump, said it was offering early retirement to 3,000 employees.Though the program is expected to save the Atlanta-based airline money in the long run, each worker who accepts the early retirement offer will cost Delta $70,000, the company said yesterday. If all the eligible workers participate, that would amount to $210 million.Prospects good for farm aid to Md.U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Mike Espy said yesterday that Maryland farmers stand a good chance of receiving federal drought relief.

The Baltimore City school system is likely to move forward with a plan to offer early retirement packages to its most experienced teachers as more than 330 have accepted the deal, which seeks to save the district millions of dollars. When the school system announced the early retirement incentive plan in February, it said at least 350 teachers had to take the plan for it to be successful, and that no more than 750 could. But city school officials said Monday that the 332 teachers who signed up were enough for the plan to go through.

After reporting a projected $8 million revenue shortfall in late January, when he announced an early retirement incentive program for county workers, Harford County Executive David Craig said Tuesday that he doesn't expect further drastic action during the fiscal year - despite $3 million in snow-removal costs and a $1.3 million decline in state income tax payments in February. "We've been pragmatic," he said, by leaving nearly 300 open county jobs vacant and attracting nearly 50 older county workers to the early retirement program.