Sacramento State will pay eligible employees to resign to avoid layoffs, according to a faculty SacSend email from Sac State President Robert Nelsen Wednesday.

Sac State’s Early Exit Program will offer severance pay to employees who voluntarily resign and execute separation agreements.

“We are offering this program as a way to support our employees who have other alternatives or who are ready to retire and, to be honest, as a critical way to avoid layoffs and furloughs that may result from the budget crisis caused by COVID-19,” Nelsen said in the email. 

The payment is approximately equivalent to a six months’ salary, with a minimum payment of $25,000 and a maximum of $70,000. The amount of the severance pay is calculated using an employee’s monthly base salary at the time of the application deadline on Oct. 3, 2020.

The minimum and maximum payments will be prorated for employees working less than full-time, according to the EEP Terms and Conditions.

Separation must occur on or before Oct. 30, 2020, except for employees serving in critical or hard-to-fill positions, working on time-sensitive projects or currently teaching in the fall 2020 semester. These employees may have separation dates later than Oct. 30.

To be eligible, employees must fulfill these requirements:

• Must be a current employee, in a permanent position, or previously served in a permanent position; or full-time faculty member with a three-year contract
• CalPERS Service Retirement Eligibility required 
• Must have at least one year of service to the University to be eligible as of Oct. 3, which does not need to be served consecutively and excludes student employment

Ineligible employees include:

• Faculty with applications pending or currently in Faculty Early Retirement Program are not eligible
• Rehired annuitants are not permanent employees and, therefore, are not eligible
• Employees who have submitted a ‘Notice of Intent to Retire’ or written voluntary resignation on or before Aug. 19, 2020 are not eligible

Provisions of the EEP are subject to change, so employees are not entitled or guaranteed participation. 

Complete applications will be processed on a first come, first serve basis. Sac State may end the EEP at any time, and not all the applications submitted will be processed before the program ends.

A one-time allocation is funding the EEP. When the EEP’s funds have been depleted, no more applications will be accepted.