Employee Benefits

If you join the City of Chesapeake as a full-time regular employee, the City will provide a foundation of benefits for you. Coverage will begin the first day of employment on the following benefits that the City provides at no cost to you.

This page provides highlights of specific aspects of the benefit program for full-time regular employees of the City of Chesapeake, such as retirement, life insurance, holidays, annual leave, and sick leave.  If you join the City, you will receive detailed descriptions of the benefit plans. The actual payment of benefits under any plan is totally governed by the respective plan.

Automatic Benefits

Retirement Plan

Planning for the future is very important, no matter how old you are. The City participates in the Virginia Retirement System (VRS) and pays the total cost of this benefit on your behalf. This plan helps you meet your retirement needs by offering:

• Full vesting after five years of employment
• The opportunity to retire at age 50 with 10 years of service or age 55 with 5 years of service with a reduced benefit.
• A benefit from the VRS will be based on:
  • Service with the City as a covered employee.
  • Your age when you start to receive benefits from the plan.
  • The average of your highest 36 months of continuous earnings.

The basic formula used by the plan is 1.7% times the highest of 36 months of continuous earnings times the number of years of covered service. The Plan has several options of payment, including a survivor benefit. To learn more about these options visit VRS' home page on the World Wide Web for complete details.

Life Insurance

The City pays the total costs of regular life insurance coverage, which is through Minnesota Life Insurance Company. You are covered up to two times your annual salary (rounded to the nearest thousand dollars) for normal death and four times of your annual salary for accidental death. You are also covered for dismemberment.

You are eligible to purchase optional life insurance for yourself and your spouse and dependent children. The costs of this coverage vary with your selection of coverage and your age.

Holidays

The City observes many paid holidays. See the full calendar of observed holidays here.

Annual Leave

Except for employees eligible to accrue leave at a higher rate due to compensatory schedules, regular full time employees accumulate annual leave per month as follows:

Length of Service	Accrual Rate
Up to 4 years	8 hours per month
5 to 9 years	10 hours per month
10 to 14 years	12 hours per month
15 to 19 years	14 hours per month
20 or more years	16 hours per month

Sick Leave

Regular full time employees accrue sick leave at 8 hours per month.

If you have any questions about the information on this page, you may contact a member of our benefits team by emailing edonohue@cityofchesapeake.net.