MEMPHIS, TN (abc24.com) - The City of Memphis is making more than 600 disabled former employees once again prove they can't work. Retirees say the Wharton administration is trying to make it look like the city is cracking down when truth is, it's just smoke and mirrors.
Letters to the retirees should be going out in the next couple weeks.
Mike Williams, President of the Memphis Police Association, calls the disabled employee audit "a wild goose chase."
Of the 609 employees, almost half are already over the age of 65.
"You have people in their 90's, 80's, 70's - if you found out they could work, where are they going to work?" Williams asked.
According to city records, the former employees will have to pay for all medical costs to prove they are still disabled. Keep in mind it was city doctors who signed off on their condition in the first place.
Truth is making disabled employees over 65 prove they are disabled doesn't make sense since they are past retirement age.
Williams says if the city is concerned about abuse, target those individuals instead of harassing the hundreds of disabled elderly employees.
He noted, "There should be a more methodical way to conduct what they are trying to do."
Truth is someone or some company is going to make money off this deal. It's not city employees who will do the audit; the work is being outsourced to a third party.
"It's politics, politics, smoke and mirrors, and the citizens need to wake up," Williams said.
So the city will spend money to make sure 80 and 90-year-old men really can't work. Of course I wanted to ask the mayor if that made sense and asked for an interview. No surprise, I never got a response.
