At LAST! Bonuses (PBIs) suspended! Thank you for a very smart (and charitable) decision, Board!

More specifically, thank you DENNIS LEONE, CRAIG BROOKS, REGINA BURCH, TAI HAYDEN, JEFF CHAPMAN AND STEVE PUCKETT! Thank you for Doing The Right Thing. You will never know how many lives this will touch. KBB

From John Curry, January 16, 2009
Subject: ***BULLETIN- Finally...SOME on the STRS Board have come to their senses!!!!!!! Bonuses have been SUSPENDED!!!!!!!!!***

Board member, Dr. Dennis Leone, brought this issue of suspending bonuses [performance-based incentives, or PBIs] up before....only to be ignored by the majority of the Board. Now, however, the board is singing a different tune, aren't they???? Isn't it strange how many times this practice tends to repeat itself? The actual vote will be revealed quite soon - and when it does you will find out who voted for and against the continuance of the six digits bonuses. When it is revealed I think some letters of congratulations and some letters of disgust are definitely in order. Finally...some sanity has been restored at 275 East Broad Street in Central City!!!!!

We, at Concerned Ohio Educators (CORE), have been strongly pushing for the bonuses to be suspended while the OEA and OFT backed board members (in the past) were strongly opposed to the suspension of the bonuses. ORTA (Ohio Retired Teachers Association) has not taken sides on this issue....so what else is new? I wonder what brought about this "change in heart" among the majority on the board? I wonder!

John

P.S. Affordable healthcare was also "a promise" to many retired educators and their spouses, wasn't it?

Teachers' pension system cuts bonuses for investment officers

Friday, January 16, 2009 11:56 AM
By James Nash
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Acknowledging "extraordinary times" in the economy, leaders of the pension system for retired Ohio teachers this morning pared back the six-figure merit bonuses given to many investment officers.

The board of the State Teachers Retirement System voted to suspend the bonus payments from February through June.

After that, the bonuses will be cut in bad economic times, but enhanced when pension investments thrive.

The pension board's 6-3 vote mollified many of the activist retired teachers who had complained about large bonuses paid to investment officers even in lean years. Last year, the pension paid nearly $6 million in performance bonuses to 89 investment officers, with 10 receiving $200,000 or more.

"In these tough economic times, I wouldn't think they would expect these kinds of bonuses," said Marie M. Fetters, a retired teacher from the Miami Trace Local Schools in Fayette County.

Pension board Chairwoman Mary Ann Quilter Cervantes, a Lucas County teacher, voted against suspending the bonus payments.

"We need to be a reliable employer," she said. "This is a switch on our word."

Board member Jeff Chapman, a retired teacher, responded that the pension's health-care fund is going broke.

"I'm also sensitive to the fact that it's a promise, but these are extraordinary times," Chapman said.