Jim N. Reed to Senator Hottinger: Dr. Thomas Hall and The STRS Needs Your Support

Senator Hottinger, we met once briefly when you were a rookie in the General Assembly and you came to Baltimore, Ohio, to participate (on foot) in a community parade. As I introduced myself as a career teacher you assured me that education would always be a most important legislative priority during your tenure.

Now, as you leave the Ohio Senate, this constituent requests one more well-done service. I am contacting you to, again, participate. Many of Ohio's 400,000 active and retired educators would also certainly appreciate this positive "lame duck" gesture from the 31st Senate District.

During your era in the General Assembly the Ohio STRS has suffered several degrees of humiliation resulting from unethical misbehavior of Board members and a "dismissed" executive director. (I am assuming you were one of the majority of legislators who suggested Herb Dyer "take a hike." What you may not have realized is that Dyer did indeed leave before the door hit him in the posterior, with a $600,000 blessing from a rubber-stamp Board.)

Unfortunately, this injustice and obscene waste of hundreds of thousands of members' contributions was but a tip of the entitlement iceberg at STRS. Many of us have been left with meltdown residue and it's ugly. Many are literally suffering from the arrogance, corruption, and greed that was ingrained during the Dyer Disaster.

The attempts at cleaning up the "House That Herb Built" have been slowed by remnants of entitlement still residing in the Board room. Were it not for the inexhaustible efforts of Board members Dr. Dennis Leone and Mr. John Lazares to resurrect sorely needed oversight and rebuild some trust and faith among the membership many more educators would be suffering in retirement after lengthy, loyal careers.

As a profession, we require more Board members with a genuine dedication to what the STRS promised us all---an affordable, secure, well-deserved retirement for ourselves and our families via an absolute, unwavering adherence to ORC 3307.15.

As I am certain your are aware, one of the eleven STRS Board seats is filled by a member jointly appointed by the Speaker of The House, the Honorable Mr. Husted, and the President of The Senate, the Honorable Mr. Harris. Geoffrey Meyers, thankfully, has recently resigned his throne. Meyers was of the corporate mentality that nearly shattered decades of hundreds of thousands of stakeholders' contributions. The squandering of the members' stake in their retirement has been a fiscal atrocity.

There is an opportunity for the General Assembly to support a continued enlightenment within STRS under Dr. Leone's and Mr. Lazares' leadership by appointing a member of parallel philosophy, one who will accept nothing less than a literal interpretation of ORC. 3305.17. I am requesting you survey the credentials of Dr. Thomas Hall, PhD and economics professor at Miami University.

Dr. Hall is an acknowledged expert in the field of economics, both as an acclaimed instructor and author. His resume is extremely impressive. He has a personal investment in the STRS and he genuinely understands the current plight of so many stakeholders.

Too many of the serious "mistakes" that have become Board members were not qualified to be fiscal managers. ($65 billion requires astute, expert attention to detail.) I believe many were not even qualified to ask necessary questions so they opted to "rubber stamp" recommendations that were, in retrospect, obviously not for the benefit of the stakeholders. It seems that those that may have had a qualified background in economics failed public relations and compassion 101. Perhaps the missing ingredient was a lack of feeling for those economically hurting, a total disconnect between fiscal lifestyles.

I, as do thousands of others who voted in the spring Board elections, believe Dr. Thomas Hall can continue the restoration of trust and accountability in the STRS initiated by Mr. Lazares and Dr. Leone.

I am urging you, Senator Hottinger, to validate what I have stated by looking at the public records of STRS in the past 15 years as Dr. Leone did in his 2003 award-winning reports. If you find them, as I believe you will, credible then I would request you urgently recommend to Speaker Husted and President Harris the appointment of Dr. Thomas Hall to fill the General Assembly's vacant seat on the STRS Board.

Thank you for your immediate attention to what matters to so many of Ohio's educators, retired, active, and prospective.

Jim N. Reed

42-year teacher-coach

Liberty Union-Thurston Local Schools

Proud CORE member