Utah state government is losing some of its most veteran and senior workers this month — nearly all early retirements coming because of a new law that on Jan. 1 cuts back health-care insurance for retired state employees.

The Utah Public Employees Association, the main state union, last week lost a court battle to stop the provisions of HB213 from taking effect. The law changes how workers can convert unused sick leave into post-retirement health insurance. State workers with 30 years or more must retire by the end of the year or lose free insurance coverage for up to 10 years.

The deadline for the early-out is Thursday. So some 30-year vets could still put in their papers.

But over the past nine months or so, the front doors of many state agencies have been swinging shut on line workers and managers alike as they left their jobs.

"We're having 14 retirement receptions this week alone," Jack Ford, spokesman of the state Department of Corrections, said Monday. Ford called the newspaper back several times one day after hearing of more retirements.

Some are leaving with a bitter taste in their mouths.

"I'm just lucky I was eligible," said Anne Nelsen, a manager in the state Division of Juvenile Justice Services with 33 years with the state. "Thanks to the Legislature and Govs. (Jon) Huntsman and (Mike) Leavitt — they've shown us tremendous disdain." Nelsen, 53, said she had to go. "I would have lost six to seven years of health insurance — that's a lot of money. They are losing their high-level people."

Almost all state agencies and departments are seeing more retirements this year, state personnel officials say. "We're going up," said Jeff Herring, executive director of the state Department of Human Resources Management.

The deadline may lead to 1,000 retirements, Herring predicted, compared to a typical year when between 350 and 400 members of the government's 24,000-person work force retires. "I think we'll see a significant bubble in December," he said. "I think people are waiting."

Already, though the end of October — the most recent data available — 486 state workers had put in their papers, compared to 328 for the same period in 2004 — nearly a 50 percent increase.

And if Herring's prediction of 1,000 employees leaving in 2005 turns out to be correct, that's almost a three-fold increase above the norm. It's enough to send state officials scrambling to shore up the loss of all that experience.

"This is the thing we kept on saying over and over, that there's going to end up being a brain drain," said Audry Wood, executive director of the UPEA.

Some agencies are being dinged more than others.