{"id":312998,"date":"2026-08-04T00:16:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T00:16:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/312998\/"},"modified":"2026-08-04T00:16:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T00:16:12","slug":"boss-of-the-beach-isnt-alone-these-nyc-retirees-also-scored-fat-pensions-on-taxpayers-tab","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/312998\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Boss of the beach’ isn’t alone: these NYC retirees also scored fat pensions on taxpayers’ tab"},"content":{"rendered":"

The \u201cBoss of the Beach\u201d is just a drop in the ocean.<\/p>\n

A gobsmacking 62 government retirees \u2014 including double-dipping former Big Apple chief lifeguard Peter Stein<\/a> \u2014 pulled pension payments of at least $200,000 last year from the city\u2019s retirement system, data shows.<\/p>\n

Stein\u2019s tsunami-sized $570,000 pension payment led all others in the New York City Employees\u2019 Retirement System during 2025, excluding back pay, the Empire Center\u2019s SeeThroughNY.net website reports<\/a>.<\/p>\n

All told, the dozens of high-flying high-earners such as Stein and scores more modest city retirees took in nearly $6.2 billion in taxpayer-funded payouts last year, according to the data.<\/p>\n

Peter Stein, the so-called \u201cBoss of the Beach,\u201d drew a $570,000 pension. Susan May Tell for NY Post<\/p>\n

\u201cThese eye-popping payouts reflect a fundamentally broken system, not just individual wrongdoing,\u201d said Abdullah Ar Rafee, a data manager at the Empire Center for Public Policy.<\/p>\n

\u201cBetween overtime spiking and legacy benefit rules, New York\u2019s pension design rewards benefit padding at the explicit expense of the public.\u201d<\/p>\n

The top pensions besides Stein\u2019s went to a grab bag of former civil servants, including a veteran prosecutor and a long-retired doctor. They are, according to the data:<\/p>\n

Nicolas Audi, retired from the Department of Environmental Protection in 2018 \u2014 with $341,487 in total pension payments.<\/p>\n

Warren Murray Jr., retired from the District Attorney\u2019s Office in 2021 \u2014 $325,015 in total pension payments.<\/p>\n

Eileen Barkow, retired from the City\u2019s Department of Information, Technology and Telecommunications in 2023 \u2014 $297,130 in total pension payments.<\/p>\n

Roger Smoke, retired from the Health and Hospitals Corporation in 2014 \u2014 $293,183 in total pension.<\/p>\n

Stein stood out from the other top retirement earners in several ways.<\/p>\n

Eileen Barkow retired from the City\u2019s Department of Information, Technology and Telecommunications in 2023, and received $297,130 in total pension payments. Eileen Barkow \/ Facebook<\/p>\n

For one, Stein retired last year and still topped the list. Only nine retirees who collected their first full-year pension during 2025 received more than $200,000, according to the Empire Center. Some 490 received six-figure payouts, the data showed.<\/p>\n

He also long faced public scrutiny for his dual career, in which he served as a full-time gym teacher and chief lifeguard, drawing the \u201cBoss of the beach\u201d nickname.<\/p>\n

Other public servants with giant golden parachutes \u2014 such as Smoke, a doctor with the city\u2019s hospital system who retired in 2014 \u2014 generated far less smoke during their careers.<\/p>\n

Likewise, Murray was a decorated prosecutor with the Manhattan District Attorney\u2019s Office and mentored scores of attorneys even into retirement, according to a glowing obituary after he died in June<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Warren Murray Jr., a longtime prosecutor, drew a $325,000 pension. Sean C. Pippen \/ LinkedIn<\/p>\n

The average pension by \u201cfull career\u201d city retirees stood at $62,582 last year.<\/p>\n

But the number of six-figure pensioners has doubled from roughly 1,600 during 2020 to 3,200 last year, according to data.<\/p>\n

Stein\u2019s pension payment was outpaced only by Lucradia Riddick, an Administration for Children\u2019s Services retiree who received a $627,886 payment, data shows.<\/p>\n

Riddick\u2019s payment, however, included roughly $404,000 in backpay.<\/p>\n

The roughly $6 billion in pension payouts for city workers last year is peanuts compared to the nearly $17 billion paid out by the state\u2019s largest retirement system.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The \u201cBoss of the Beach\u201d is just a drop in the ocean. A gobsmacking 62 government retirees \u2014…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":312999,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[57,9,81504,56,63,65,64,240,1577,58],"class_list":["post-312998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city-employees-retirement-system","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-pensions","tag-retirement","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=312998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/312999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=312998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=312998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=312998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}