When Ferguson-Florissant Superintendent Jeff Spiegel retires at the end of this school year at age 56, he'll leave the district with the rare benefit of health insurance coverage for the rest of his life.

The School Board added the incentive to convince Spiegel to delay his retirement and stay on as superintendent this year. Although the board estimates the insurance should cost no more than $218,398, the actual cost is unknown.

Last summer, Spiegel informed board members of his desire to retire after the 2009-10 school year, according to Les Lentz, current president of the board.

Documents obtained by the Post-Dispatch show the board then voted in closed session to amend the superintendent's contract to allow Spiegel and his wife to participate in the school district's group health plan for active employees for the remainder of his life at the district's expense.

The benefit is not typical of Missouri superintendent contracts, said Audrey Spalding, who has studied more than 450 superintendent contracts for her work at the Show-Me Institute, a financially conservative think tank based in St. Louis. Spiegel already gets a contribution to an annuity ($17,740 yearly) and car allowance ($781 monthly). His salary is $211,653.

That makes him one of the best compensated superintendents in the state, Spalding said.

The time and expense of seeking a new superintendent, as well as a desire for stability in these challenging budget times, could push school district leaders to hold on to someone they like, said John Urkevich, executive director of the Cooperating School Districts of Greater St. Louis.

The Ferguson-Florissant School Board president has defended its decision to add the post-retirement health insurance coverage, saying Spiegel has helped the district remain financially stable and fully accredited without laying off employees.

But teachers and other staff members are upset. They'd heard rumors of Spiegel's added benefit at a time when the district was offering early retirement to about 85 employees. Under the voluntary plan, those with the district for 30 or more years received three years of paid health and dental insurance premiums. Most of the positions were not filled for this school year.

"The reports were disturbing, and now finding that it is true is more so," said Sandra Goforth-McDougal, president of the Ferguson-Florissant National Education Association.

The Mehlville School District dealt with a similar issue earlier this year, illustrating the lengths to which a school board will go to keep its superintendent from being lured away by generous retirement pensions. In April, the board offered Terry Noble a $38,000 pay increase plus an additional $25,000 to stay on the job for three more years and keep him from retiring. That raised Noble's salary to $226,000 a year.

But the raise turned into a public relations disaster when district residents objected. And with a looming ballot question seeking a tax increase from residents this fall, Noble decided last month to give back the large pay boost, calling it a "distraction." Noble said it was "not good for the welfare of our district to interfere with our needs."

Instead, the Mehlville School Board voted Aug. 19 to give Noble a 6 percent pay increase.

In Ferguson-Florissant, district officials estimate the highest potential cost of offering lifetime benefits to Spiegel and his wife at about $218,398. They based the estimate on coverage to age 78, the average U.S. life expectancy.

The estimate assumes that both Spiegel and his wife will not work after June 30, that both reach age 78 and that they choose the most expensive insurance option.

The cost of the agreement to the district could be zero if both Spiegel and his wife work until age 65 and select the lowest-cost supplemental insurance option, officials said.

Spiegel, 55, declined to be interviewed for this story. In a statement released through a district spokeswoman, he said multiple factors influenced his decision to retire:

"Last year, we completed our regular state review process and remained fully accredited. I was pleased we accomplished that goal and said I wanted to retire. The board asked me to stay. They made me an offer and I accepted it."

Publicly, Spiegel announced in May his plans to retire at the end of the 2010-11 school year. He will have been superintendent for seven years and a district educator since 1976.

The lifetime health insurance benefit will be particularly useful to Spiegel until he is eligible for Medicare benefits at age 65.

Lentz, who also declined an interview, said in a statement that the school board stands by its decision made at a time when other districts are facing financial catastrophe, employee layoffs and loss of accreditation.

Other school board members did not return messages, declined to comment or referred calls to Lentz.

Spalding, of the Show-Me Institute, said that if school board members were having a difficult time persuading Spiegel to stay at the district, they could have awarded something that could be built into the budget, such as an increase in salary for one year, or an increased annuity payment — something other school districts occasionally do.

The health insurance Spiegel was awarded is an unknown expense — it is impossible to know how long he and his wife will use the benefit, she said.

District officials defended the decision, saying that Spiegel has served as Ferguson-Florissant superintendent longer than any district leader in the past 29 years and is the only area superintendent with a 35-year tenure in the district he leads. His salary, unchanged from last year, is less than new superintendents hired for this year by Hazelwood, Rockwood and Clayton.

Ferguson-Florissant has nearly 12,000 students across 23 schools and nearly 2,000 employees. The budget is about $130 million.

"Our teachers, like Mr. Spiegel, are taking a salary freeze, and I think we all would have been very happy had someone offered to have included lifetime benefits as well," said Goforth-McDougal, the union president. "While that may not be money out of our pocket right now, who knows?"