Catherine Baker worked for San Mateo County as a Social Worker III. She reported back pain that prevented her from performing some essential job duties. She went on medical leave in 2009. In 2015, she returned to work in a different position as a Screener Trainee. The Screener Trainee job had the same pay rate as her original position. On January 21, 2016, Baker left County employment.
In 2017, Baker applied for a “service-connected” disability retirement. The County Employees Retirement Association (SamCERA) recommended that, pursuant to the County Employees Retirement Law of 1937 at Government Code section 31724, the effective date of her retirement benefit was January 22, 2016, the day after her last receipt of “regular compensation.”
After SamCERA’s Board approved her application and set the effective date, Baker sought administrative review. She felt that her compensation as a Screener Trainee did not qualify as “regular compensation” because she had not returned to her Social Worker III job. She argued that her effective date of retirement should have been in 2009 when she left her Social Worker III job. An administrative law judge recommended denial of her request to change the effective date, and the Board adopted this recommendation. Baker then filed a petition for writ of administrative mandamus in the California Superior Court, which denied the petition and confirmed the January 22, 2016, effective date.
The California Court of Appeal reviewed whether “regular compensation”, as used in section 31724, included Baker’s pay as a Screener Trainee. To make its decision, the Court looked at the ordinary meaning of the words “regular compensation” and to prior case law. The prior case law held that the term “regular compensation” includes compensation for sick leave taken as time off because, during such periods, employees receive their “regular salary” or “full wages.” The Court held that “regular compensation” refers to regular salary or full wages, regardless of whether the position is the employee’s original job.
Because Baker’s Screener Trainee pay matched her original position’s pay rate, it qualified as “regular compensation.” The court affirmed the trial court’s judgment, upholding the effective retirement date that SamCERA had set.
Baker v. San Mateo County Employees Retirement Association, 2025 Cal.App. LEXIS 563.