NOTE: To find the most current posts, please scroll down to the two big red arrows. You can't miss them.

STRS Ohio Watchdogs: a public Facebook group you can join

STRS OHIO WATCHDOGS

by Cindy Murphy

STRS Ohio Watchdogs monitor the management and investment practices of the State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio.

We advocate for prudent and transparent investments, the restoration of the COLA for retired teachers, and the rollback of additional years of service required for active teachers.

This site will provide you with information about the work that is being done by Ohio's active and retired teachers to preserve our retirement benefits. Check back often for updates.

Join our conversation on Facebook. You don't have to be a member of STRS Ohio to join. Everyone who is interested in learning more about the management and investment practices of STRS Ohio is welcome.

Use this link to join our pack on Facebook:.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/ohiostrswatchdogs 

Have you joined the Ohio STRS Member Only Forum on Facebook?

If you are a member of STRS Ohio and have a Facebook account, you are eligible to join thousands of others who make up the Ohio STRS Member Only Forum. This is a closed group of retirees and actives who are advocating for the return of our COLA, which, as you no doubt know, your STRS Board SUSPENDED on April 20, 2017. Two of our members, Bob Buerkle and Dean Dennis, filed a class action lawsuit against STRS on May 23, 2019 suing for the reinstatement of our COLA. The text of the lawsuit can be found on this blog. You can go here to join the Forum and sign the petition, already signed by more than 20,000 people, for the return of our COLA: Ohio STRS Member Only Forum

Click image to enlarge

Angel of Grief

Garrison Keillor

Items of interest in the Archives: The 2013 STRS Board Election

Many people have been very interested in reading about the irregularities of the 2013 STRS board election. There are many posts related to this topic, beginning the first week of April 2013, after the ballots were mailed to retirees from STRS. You can find them by going to the Archives for this blog, over in the right sidebar, and clicking on dates beginning with April 7, 2013. Dennis Leone announced his candidacy for a retired seat in November, 2012. There is a lot of information about him in the Archives, beginning with November 12, 2012 posts. If you want to read only the best stuff about that infamous election of 2013, go over to the sidebar on the right of where you are now, which is the archives of previous articles on this blog. Scroll down to April 2013. That's where the "interesting" articles begin. You will see many, clear up to the middle of May 2013.5/28/13

.....so what REALLY happened in 2003 that touched off a firestorm at STRS that is still smoldering today? Read it here, from the Cleveland Plain Dealer. (Hint: It ain't over yet!)

More here (Akron Beacon Journal, 2003)

A MUST READ: Dennis Leone Reform Initiatives as an STRS Board Member  Between 2005 and 2009

To find current, day-to-day posts -- pull your scroll bar down a ways, just below the big red arrows (you can't miss them). Thanks.

............................................................................................

Find your state representative and senator here.

http://www.legislature.state.oh.us/

I know, it's weird.........

Many posts that appear "at the top" for a while are eventually moved down, where they can be found under their original posting dates. Also, if you are confused by the postdating, this is done to keep these posts up there; otherwise, they drift down when new posts are added. It's a "blog thing" which I have no other way to control. KB

Handy links: Contacts, information and more (short version)
This is an abbreviated version of the original 'Handy links' post. Click here to view a more complete list. (Some of it is old.)

STRS Board.....STRS website

Board calendar

E-mail contacts at STRS (old, but some may still work)

Map/directions to STRS, 275 E. Broad St. Columbus, OH 43215

STRS "Membership Survey" (spoof)
State legislators.......State of Ohio website

Latest OEA salaries (2011) over 100K; USDL report

Rich DeColibus' PowerPoint presentation STRS' PBI Program; Does it work?: click December 21, 2008 (blog Archive) and scroll down to December 23 posts.

Charts: PBI (bonus) payments

Popular links; click, then scroll down: charts, graphs, investment staff, lists, spreadsheets

$TR$ Inve$tment $taff $$$ (old)

SPECIAL (must read):

Dennis Leone's INVESTIGATIVE REPORT on STRS: May 16, 2003...Who is Dennis Leone?........(PDF version)...More on Dennis Leone .......(PDF version)

Dennis Leone: "Catcher of Thieves"

Dennis Leone's STRS Report to ORTA, March 2007

Dennis Leone's Testimony at the Statehouse 9/5/12
The Plain Dealer article that started it all

Dennis Leone: Factors Driving STRS 30-Year Planning and Revenue Assumptions (with charts)

Historic PBI vote, January 16, 2009

Charts: PBI (bonus) payments

CURRENT POSTS BELOW

From ORTA: Ohio teachers pension board members sue Attorney General Dave Yost over legal fees

Ohio teachers pension board members sue Attorney General Dave Yost over legal fees

Writer: ORTA 

August 15, 2025

Two former STRS Ohio board members are suing Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost over legal representation in a lawsuit against them.*

What happens when your lawyer sues you and he gets to pick which attorneys can defend you and how much they should get paid?

State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio Board Chairman Rudy Fichtenbaum and former Board Member Wade Steen are suing Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost over just that question.

In May 2024, Yost sued Fichtenbaum and Steen, accusing them of violating their fiduciary duty to act in the best interest of the public pension system.

The Ohio attorney general is the lawyer for STRS and its board members. If outside counsel is hired to represent the state on any matter, it's the attorney general whomakes that call.

But Steen and Fichtenbaum hired their own legal team to represent them and sent their legal bills to Yost for payment. The attorney general's office declined to cover the bills and asserted that Yost would pick their lawyers and determined how much they should be paid, according to a new lawsuit filed Franklin County Common Pleas Court.

Steen and Fichtenbaum balked at this arrangement. Their legal team sued Yost. It's the latest dramatic twist at STRS, the state's second largest public pension system. The board oversees $95 billion invested on behalf of 500,000 retirees and teachers.

The fund has faced historic turmoil in recent years that has included top manager departures, anonymous memos, multiple lawsuits and an ethics investigation.

The turmoil prompted state legislators to revamp the pension board. STRS Ohio is currently governed by an 11-member board of four appointed financial experts, five teachers and two retirees. Teachers and retirees will lose their majority, and power will shift to financial experts appointed by politicians.

STRS is one of five public pension systems in Ohio. Combined, the five systems have about $225 billion invested for 655,000 public employees, 486,000 retirees and 1.1 million former government workers.

Public employees in Ohio aren't in the Social Security system, so the pension funds are their primary retirement money.

Read this article online at https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/state/2025/08/15/strs-ohio-pension-board-chair-sues-ohio-attorney-general-dave-yost/85665537007/ 

*Correction:  Rudy Fichtenbaum is not a former STRS Ohio Board member. He is currently the Chairman of the STRS Ohio Retirement Board.

STRS Ohio Board member Rudy Fichtenbaum and former Board member Wade Steen are incurring legal fees, defending themselves against the lawsuit brought against them by Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost. As you might imagine, the cost to defend a person from attack by the two most powerful people in the state is tremendous. ORTA will use donations from the Pension Defense Fund to help them pay their legal expenses. Help us fight for your pension by donating to ORTA's Pension Defense Fund. Make a donation today to the ORTA Pension Defense Fund

Related posts: Ohio AG files lawsuit to remove two state teachers' pension board members

Court document filed 8/14/2025: Rudy Fichtenbaum and Wade Steen vs Dave Yost

 

Teachers retirement board members sue Ohio attorney general

 nbc4i.com News

Columbus

August 15. 2-25

Teachers retirement board members sue Ohio attorney general

by:  Kevin Accettulla, Colleen Marshall

Posted: Aug 15, 2025 

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — The chairman of the State Teachers Retirement System board and a former member filed a lawsuit Thursday against Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost for allegedly refusing to provide them with legal representation in a previously filed lawsuit.

Rudy Fichtenbaum and former member Wade Steen claim that when Yost sued them in 2024, he failed to provide them with legal representation, as required by Ohio law when sued in connection with their roles with STRS.

The pair claims they hired their own legal representation and were reminded that Yost was obligated to provide them counsel. They contacted Yost’s representatives asking the state to pay for the lawyer fees.

“Without explanation, [Yost] indicated he would not pay the fees for their lawyers,” according to the lawsuit. “Instead General Yost insisted that he would himself select counsel to oppose him in that case, selecting from among the several lawyers who he had worked with previously.”

Yost selecting his opponents and determining how much they would be paid is “unethical, improper and illegal,” the lawsuit states, so they refused the proposal.

“The conduct of [Yost] is intended to disadvantage [Fichtenbaum and Steen] in that such conduct deprives [Fichtenbaum and Steen] of their right to due process of law,” the lawsuit states.

In a statement to NBC4, the attorney general’s office said STRS has insurance for defending its board members.

“The AG’s officer offered both Steen and Fichtenbaum outside counsel through their insurance carrier,” the spokesperson said. 

“Both of them refused this counsel and insisted on their own private counsel. The state never pays bills for private counsel hired by state employees. In this case there was an insurance policy to cover attorney fees for these two individuals, through approved counsel. There is an established process for paying the attorney bills in this situation. Just because they don’t like the process doesn’t mean they get to make the state, through the taxpayers, pay for their private attorneys.”

Fichtenbaum and Steen are seeking unspecified damages.

Read the article online here: https://www.nbc4i.com/news/local-news/columbus/teachers-retirement-board-members-sue-ohio-attorney-general/ 

Video for above article

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CkSHLvqAHw 

Ohio teachers pension board members sue Attorney General Dave Yost over legal fees

Two former STRS Ohio board members are suing Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost over legal representation in a lawsuit against them

By Laura A. Bischoff

Columbus Dispatch

August 15, 2025

Key Points AI-assisted summary

•  Yost sued the board members for alleged breach of fiduciary duty, and they hired their own lawyers, whose fees Yost refused to pay.

•  The lawsuit is the latest development in ongoing turmoil at STRS Ohio, including management changes and investigations.

•  STRS Ohio manages $95 billion for 500,000 members and is undergoing a board restructure.

What happens when your lawyer sues you and he gets to pick which attorneys can defend you and how much they should get paid?

State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio Board Chairman Rudy Fichtenbaum and former Board Member Wade Steen are suing Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost over just that question.

In May 2024, Yost sued Fichtenbaum and Steen, accusing them of violating their fiduciary duty to act in the best interest of the public pension system.

The Ohio attorney general is the lawyer for STRS and its board members. If outside counsel is hired to represent the state on any matter, it's the attorney general who makes that call.

But Steen and Fichtenbaum hired their own legal team to represent them and sent their legal bills to Yost for payment. The attorney general's office declined to cover the bills and asserted that Yost would pick their lawyers and determined how much they should be paid, according to a new lawsuit filed Franklin County Common Pleas Court.

Steen and Fichtenbaum balked at this arrangement. Their legal team sued Yost.

It's the latest dramatic twist at STRS, the state's second largest public pension system. The board oversees $95 billion invested on behalf of 500,000 retirees and teachers.

The fund has faced historic turmoil in recent years that has included top manager departures, anonymous memos, multiple lawsuits and an ethics investigation.

The turmoil prompted state legislators to revamp the pension board. STRS Ohio is currently governed by an 11-member board of four appointed financial experts, five teachers and two retirees. Teachers and retirees will lose their majority, and power will shift to financial experts appointed by politicians.

STRS is one of five public pension systems in Ohio. Combined, the five systems have about $225 billion invested for 655,000 public employees, 486,000 retirees and 1.1 million former government workers.

Public employees in Ohio aren't in the Social Security system, so the pension funds are their primary retirement money.

Read this article online here. 

State government reporter Laura Bischoff can be reached at lbischoff@gannett.com and @lbischoff on X.

Trina Prufer on STRS: "... a public retirement system that puts its membership into financial peril, and does not fully disclose the inadequacy of the benefit, is a malevolent institution.

From Trina Prufer

August 11, 2025 

Pension Adequacy and Unjust Enrichment 

Every day I ponder the plight of STRS members and know in my heart that none of this is fair or normal for a public retirement system. The human costs of 2012 “pension reform” are far beyond what other systems have done to maintain sustainability. 

We know that STRS is an outlier because it takes more from members than it gives back. In effect, it has a license to steal. But what are the moral, ethical and legal arguments?  

When viewed from the vantage point of a typical classroom teacher, the pension benefit is not ADEQUATE to sustain life in old age. Pension adequacy (70% replacement) is the gold standard of public pensions. If the lifespan of a typical teacher is 28 years in retirement, the defined-benefit diminishes into the 30-40% (or lower) replacement range. Social Security alone is designed to replace about 40% throughout the lifespan and has an automatic COLA tied to inflation. Without inflation protection, the STRS defined benefit is a humanitarian disaster engineered by the State of Ohio. How does that serve the needs of the public, which was the rational for “pension reform” in the first place? 

By taking more from educators than the defined benefit is worth, has STRS drifted into the realm of “unjust enrichment”?   In other words, what gives the STATE the authority to extract wealth from teachers just for the privilege of becoming a teacher? 

 If STRS offers no financial benefit to members over Social Security and investing a similar amount in a 401 K, what is its purpose? We need to request that a modeling study be done to answer this very question. Furthermore, a public retirement system that puts its membership into financial peril, and does not fully disclose the inadequacy of the benefit, is a malevolent institution. Is the State of Ohio unjustly enriching itself? Perhaps that is an issue the courts need to decide.

Trina Prufer: The Duplicity of STRS and how it Harmed Members by not providing Full Disclosure

The Duplicity of STRS and how it Harmed Members by not providing Full Disclosure 

From Trina Prufer

August 3, 2025

We all know that “reform” legislation, passed in 2012, removed the 3% annual automatic COLA from the defined-benefit. But did you know that it took years before members fully understood what the revised COLA statute (3307.67) actually meant? 

One purpose of the legislation was to remove the obligated 3% annual automatic COLA from the unfunded liability, as the debt had grown so large, as to topple the system. The d-b obligation could no longer be sustained, not because the COLA was unreasonable for the rates contributed, but because for years STRS had minimized the impact of the debt on the system, and had done nothing about it. 

I have written before about how the ORC (3307.67) and the accompanying Intent Statement do not convey the same information. The Intent Statement contains the unvarnished truth: teachers would no longer have any “ legitimate expectation“ of a COLA, forever. That information was hidden from members and not put into the ORC on purpose. What that meant in real terms is that a portion of money contributed on your behalf by your district to pre-fund the obligation would now now be re-routed to pay off the debt, removing the 3% annual automatic COLA from the liability. 

But what was STRS telling members? It was telling members the exact opposite…essentially that current retirees would receive a 2% COLA from then on. It was the qualifier (COLA could be adjusted if fiscal integrity not met) that was the real driver of in the law. No one would realize that the statute had removed the COLA from the benefit. Members were led to the slaughter. Every member needed to fully understand what a benefit without a COLA looked like in order to mitigate the effects of inflation over time. The sooner money could be invested into another income stream, the better. Everyone needed FULL DISCLOSURE, but especially future retirees in determining if the PLOP was right for them. 

STRS was fully aware it would never pay a consistent 2% COLA to retirees as it was not built into the funding model. The State Legislature controlled the funding model by setting the contribution rates. STRS and the State exacerbated the financial harm to members by withholding critical information. 

Below is the Intent Statement (conveniently left out of the ORC) and what STRS conveyed to members after the passage of the legislation. STRS owes that 2% annual COLA to all retirees because that’s what it wanted them to believe.

Melissa Cropper: "We’ll also be fighting like hell to hold each and every representative who voted for this budget accountable, not just in general elections but in primary elections too, and not just in the next election year but for the rest of their political careers."

From Melissa Cropper,

President of OFT,

To Chad Smith, 

Newly elected STRS board member

Dear Chad,

I’m writing to you with more details about one of the harmful policies that was slipped into the Ohio budget – changing the composition of the State Teachers Retirement System (STRS) Board – and why it’s an attack on all public employees in Ohio.

Currently, the STRS Board has seven members who are elected by the STRS membership (five contributing members and two retirees) and four appointed members. The other four public employee pension systems in Ohio also have boards where the majority of seats are held by elected representatives.

In the very final stage of the budget process, Republican leadership, under the direction of Speaker Matt Huffman and Senate President Rob McColley, inserted a proposal from Rep. Adam Bird that changes the STRS Board to add four new appointed positions and remove four elected positions, creating a board that will eventually have eight appointed members and only three elected members. This policy was not in the Governor’s budget, the House’s budget, or the Senate’s budget, which means it was passed with absolutely no hearings and no public participation.

This provision applies to STRS only. While Ohio’s other pension funds are not directly affected by this policy change, legislators are sending a very clear message to those funds, including OPERS and SERS: if you elect representatives who make decisions we disagree with, we’ll take over your pension fund.

This is a targeted attack on educators that follows a long campaign of misinformation, anonymous allegations, and politicized investigations against elected members of the STRS Board. The root cause of these attacks is that entrenched administrators and politicians want STRS to keep doing business as usual, while STRS members have elected board members who challenged the status quo by questioning STRS’s investment policies and decisions about member benefits. As a reminder, the status quo was that retirees were not receiving regular cost of living adjustments and active members needed 34 years of service for a full retirement (and that was on the verge of being increased to 35 years).

Thanks to the work of elected board members, including OFT members Julie Sellers, Liz Jones, and Pat Davidson, progress has been made on both of these issues while still keeping the system fiscally sound. Board members have pledged to keep fighting for more COLAs and more reductions to the years of service requirement. Disenfranchising STRS members and taking away our elected representatives, will hurt our ability to keep making improvements.

In 1952, bank robber Willie Sutton was famously quoted as saying he robbed banks “because that's where the money is." With STRS holding more than $90 billion in assets – and the other Ohio pension funds holding billions and billions more – it is no surprise that legislators want to exert more control over these funds.

But it’s our retirement, not theirs. We are outraged by this politician takeover of our pension and we won’t accept it without a fight. We are in discussions with our national partners at AFT to explore our legal options.

We’re also looking into a proactive legislative strategy to defend our elected STRS Board seats. In mid-August, after we’ve worked out a few more details, we’ll be contacting you with more details on legislative action and outreach to legislators. Please keep an eye for that update. We’ll need all OFT members, local unions, and allies to take action.

Additionally, prior to this budget passing, we’ve been working with the Ohio AFL-CIO to start a public pensions coalition to defend the rights and retirement security of all Ohio public employees – work that is even more urgent now.

We’ll also be fighting like hell to hold each and every representative who voted for this budget accountable, not just in general elections but in primary elections too, and not just in the next election year but for the rest of their political careers. If you are interested in staying up to date on OFT’s political mobilization efforts, you can opt-in to regular email updates here.

I also want to share this op-ed in the Columbus Dispatch, written by Bill Boone, President of the Berea Federation of Teachers and Chair of OFT’s Retirement Committee: STRS Board was a victim of a hostile takeover. Teachers like me are at risk.

Finally, I want to highlight exactly which board seats are being eliminated. The timeline below shows how the composition of the Board will change over time. First, four new appointed positions will be added on September 28, 2025. Then, four elected positions will be phased out when the current terms expire. That means that in 2028, when all changes are complete, the only elected representatives will be the most recently elected Board members. That will have the effect of eliminating the board seats held by all three female board members, the only Black board member, and all three OFT members on the board. The three remaining board members are also members who we’ve supported in elections, including AAUP-AFT retiree Rudy Fichtenbaum.

STRS Board Timeline

Absent any legal challenges or legislative changes, this is how the STRS Board composition will change over time.

Through August 31, 2025 — 4 appointees and 7 elected (11 total). Elected members: Correthers, Sellers, Jones, Davidson, Flanigan, Fichtenbaum, Harkness,

September 1, 2025 - September 28, 2025 — 4 appointees and 7 elected (11 total). Elected members: Sellers, Jones, Davidson, Flanigan, Fichtenbaum, Harkness, Smith)

September 28, 2025 - August 31, 2026 — 8 appointees and 7 elected (15 total). Elected members: Sellers, Jones, Davidson, Flanigan, Fichtenbaum, Harkness, Smith)

September 1, 2026- August 31, 2027 — 8 appointees and 5 elected (13 total). Elected members: Davidson, Flanigan, Fichtenbaum, Harkness, Smith)

September 1, 2027 - August 31, 2028 — 8 appointees and 4 elected (12 total). Elected members: Flanigan, Fichtenbaum, Harkness, Smith)

September 1, 2028 - August 31, 2029 — 8 appointees and 3 elected (11 total). Elected members: Fichtenbaum, Harkness, Smith)

We will keep you updated on our efforts to stop this obscene legislative overreach. Please let us know if you have any questions.

In Solidarity,

Melissa Cropper, President

Ohio Federation of Teachers

Watchdog says politicians blocking transparency for teachers pension fund; Steve Toole, executive director of STRS, declines interview by Colleen Marshall

NBC4 Columbus

July 31, 2025

A retiree's watchdog group says Ohio politicians are trying to block transparency at the State Teachers Retirement System by silencing the voice of teachers, and replacing educators on the STRS board with political appointees. 

View Colleen Marshall's interview with JD Tremmel, co-founder of QED investment firm, here.

Colleen Marshall: A retirees’ watchdog group said Ohio politicians are trying to block transparency at the State Teachers Retirement System by silencing the voice of teachers and replacing educators on the STRS board with political appointees.

NBC4 Investigates

Amid STRS board changes, watchdog group raises concerns

by: Colleen Marshall

July 31, 2025 

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – A retirees’ watchdog group said Ohio politicians are trying to block transparency at the State Teachers Retirement System by silencing the voice of teachers and replacing educators on the STRS board with political appointees.

There have been several years of chaos at the massive pension system, with retired teachers denied cost-of-living increases and the Ohio attorney general filing a civil complaint against two board members.

Much of the power struggle can be traced to a 2020 investment proposal from a private investment entity known as QED. For the first time, one of the founders of QED, JD Tremmel, goes on the record.

Tremmel co-founded the private investment group. Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost said QED then teamed up with some STRS board members as part of an attempted hostile takeover of the $96 billion pension fund. However, Tremmel said they didn’t want to “take over” STRS – they wanted to save it from politicians and poor investments.

“I would say it’s not about me or QED or anything of that sort,” Tremmel said. “It’s about the teachers.”

Tremmel knows that Ohio’s retired teachers have gone years without promised annual cost-of-living increases, and he believes it’s because their pension fund underperforms the market.

“And they deserve better than this,” he said. “I mean, they deserve to have what they were promised, and under the current format, unless the taxpayers of the state of Ohio bail them out with $15 million a day, it’s not going to happen.”

Tremmel believes the STRS pension is poorly invested and not sustainable.

“They’re underperforming by the amount of their fees and trading costs, plus a little bit in the alternatives,” he said. “I mean, it’s difficult to be uniquely stupid somehow. It’s difficult to be uniquely smart.”

As part of a proposal made by QED in 2020, instead of having the internal STRS investment staff control the billions in retirement funds, transfer some of the pension money to better-performing index funds.

When asked, Tremmel admitted that part of the motivation behind QED’s involvement was to make money for the firm.

“Most certainly there’s an economic component of it,” he said. “The, the discussions we had had with board members, we weren’t going to receive any fixed fees, which is simply a percentage of the profits above an index.”

So QED would get paid when the investments performed better than the market. Tremmel said that last year, in the hands of the STRS staff, the pension fund performed nearly $1 billion below what it could have made through a passive index fund.

In 2020, QED was pushing the index fund proposal through then-board member Wade Steen and current board president Dr. Rudy Fichtenbaum. Steen and Fichtenbaum are the targets of Yost’s civil lawsuit, which claims they were working with QED for a hostile takeover of the fund. Tremmel admits communication with Steen, even texting during board meetings, which he admits was unusual.

“I’m not sure if it’s inappropriate,” he said. “I mean, I think from a fiduciary standpoint, they should rely upon people they believe who have an expertise in a subject matter. To the extent that we help educate board members about the issues, it STRS and, you know, encourage them to ask certain questions to gain more information.

“I mean, we’re not going to apologize for that,” Tremmel added. “We think that’s the ethical thing to do.”

New STRS CEO Stephen Toole had repeatedly turned down NBC4 interview requests, including not responding to a detailed list of questions due to pending litigation. However, STRS did release the following statement:

“STRS Ohio respects the legislature’s decision to restructure the retirement board. We are committed to working with state lawmakers to ensure a smooth implementation while upholding our mission to provide Ohio’s public educators a foundation for their financial security.”

Teachers (active and retired): Your pension belongs to YOU; ORTA needs YOUR HELP to keep it in YOUR HANDS, NOT those of a few clandestine politicians!

From ORTA

Dr. Robin Rayfield, Executive Director

July 2025

Your pension belongs to you, not to a handful of clandestine politicians.
Help us fight for you by donating to ORTA's Pension Defense Fund.

As luck would have it, ORTA was in the process of changing the format of our newsletter when the recent action taken by the people in the Ohio Statehouse occurred. Since the ‘midnight massacre’ resulted in STRS members’ voices being silenced by the politicians on July 1, 2025, many groups, including ORTA, have voiced opposition to this action.

For those that are not aware of what happened, a summary is in order…

As the budget bill for Ohio was in its final stages, the chair of the ORSC, Adam Bird (a retired school administrator) placed an amendment in the budget bill that removed four elected STRS board members and replaced these four members with four ‘political appointees.’ This action ensures that the politicians, not the elected members (who are active and retired Ohio teachers), of the STRS board control the management of our retirement system. This is a calculated effort to thwart reform at STRS.

Interesting is the fact that over 5 years ago, ORTA went to the ORSC chair, Kirk Schuring, with a request that the legislators help with suggested reforms to the STRS pension system. ORTA’s concerns were centered around increasing transparency, changing the investment strategies, and modifying the performance-based incentives (bonus) policies. Mr. Schuring, a friend to educators who has since passed away, informed ORTA that the STRS members that the answer to reforming the STRS pension rested with the STRS board, not the legislators. He was direct in offering us advice that if teachers wanted to reform the system, they simply needed to elect STRS board members that would push for reforms. Well, we did just that. Over the next six elections for seats, members of STRS voted for people that pledged to reform the system.

The politicians in Ohio, led by Governor DeWine, have engaged in politically motivated actions to stop the reform efforts at STRS Ohio. Examples of this effort to stop reform:

•  Governor DeWine illegally removed reform-minded Wade Steen. Mr. Steen won his challenge to DeWine’s illegal removal in court with a unanimous judgment by the courts.

•  DeWine then charged his attorney general Dave Yost with charging two reform board members, Wade Steen and Rudy Fichtenbaum for failing to fulfill their fiduciary duty and attempted to remove them from the board. Both are defending themselves in court at the present time. What is laughable is that the reason Yost charged these two men is based upon an anonymous memo written by the STRS management. We now know through court documents that the anonymous letter was written by STRS management who stood to lose power and money through the reforms.

•  When reformers won yet another seat on the STRS board, the governor and his henchmen attacked the STRS pension board with the current amendment to remove the elected seats on the pension board.

What is the response by ORTA?

ORTA is currently working with other interested parties to develop a broad-based response to this attack on democracy. It is imperative that the people negatively impacted by the politician’s latest move fight back. ORTA intends to work with the major unions of educators in Ohio to correct this injustice and ensure that teachers have a majority of voices on the STRS board. We hope to have a unified strategy developed and begin implementing this strategy soon.

ORTA has been asked several questions about this struggle. Listed below are some of the more common questions and responses:

•  Why would the governor and other political leaders go to such great lengths to silence teacher’s voices? This is difficult to answer as politicians rarely speak the truth about their motivations. Anything we say as an answer is an opinion. First, we follow the adage, follow the money.’ Are the politicians so dependent upon the money that Wall St. pays into the political system? Is the dark money that pollutes our political system so powerful that elected officials will turn their back on democracy? Another possibility is that this is yet another way to attack public education. Considering that the politicians reduced funding for public education in the current budget while putting over one billion dollars into private education, the elected officials in Ohio clearly want to destroy public schools. Taking away the benefit of a public pension for teachers certainly fits with this theory.

•  What reforms have taken place thus far that justify such an action by the legislators? What the media in Ohio have described as chaos at the STRS board is really nothing more than robust discussion about a system that has failed to deliver promised benefits to its members for over a decade. With the reduction in promised benefits beginning in 2012, members of STRS have questioned what is taking place at our pension. When it was exposed that investment employees at STRS were receiving bonus payments using their own performance as the benchmark people began asking questions. With a majority of seats controlled by status quo board members these questions were ignored. As more reformers were elected, these questions could no longer be ignored. To placate the membership a few of the promised benefits were restored. Promised COLAs in 2021, partial COLAs in 23, 24, and 25 were provided easing the burden of inflation. Changes in the performance-based incentive policy were implemented. These changes were resisted by the status quo members and robust discussion ensued. Discussion is not chaos. It is fiduciary duty in action. When the AG’s office and the governor do not get their way, the media intentionally print misleading information to show that there is chaos.

•  What reforms would ORTA like to see? Of course, ORTA would like to see a complete restoration of benefits, i.e., 30 years of service and guaranteed COLA. As teachers we are familiar with compromise as we negotiated contracts throughout our careers. Rarely did we get everything we wanted at the bargaining table. We have been asked many times, “Will we ever get back to 30 years and 3% annual COLAs?’ ORTA’s response is ‘Maybe not, but we can work to get there.’ Currently, the years of service are 32 years. There is no permanent COLA. ORTA would support changes in the pension system that the board is working toward. It appears (this has not been stated by the board) that a stabilization effort the land at 32 years of service and a permanent COLA of 2% would be a compromise that everyone could live with.

ORTA would also fight for transparency at STRS. Despite STRS claims that they are transparent and share investment data, the facts simply do not match these claims. As stakeholders (and the ones that pay into the system) STRS members should know what the investment returns are. Not what STRS claims the investments returns are, but the actual, externally verified returns are. Any bonus payments must be measured against a bona fide metric, and the externally verified returns must be used. This does not seem like chaos to ORTA. This is a reasonable standard to use when paying for performance.

ORTA recognizes that this recent move by the legislators is an attempt to wipe out all the recent success our members have enjoyed. Our victory in the Wade Steen court case, and our financial assistance with Dr. Fichtenbaum’s defense are important. However, these two legal battles have come at a high price.

The Pension Defense Fund has collected nearly $100,000. However, our costs are nearly $250,000. We need your help!

If ORTA joins in a coalition of other groups to fight the battle against the board takeover by the politicians, the need will be even greater. Our Pension Defense Fund needs are growing. With over 2,000 individuals contributing to the cause, the effort is a grassroots effort.

If you are able, I urge you to go to www.orta.org/defense-fund to make your contribution today.