Ummm.....Jessica, you forgot the retirees, didn't you?

From John Curry, April 8, 2011

Jessica,

I am a retired public school educator. Upon reading your article below I find you only supply the readers a half truth as your article contains an omission about some other victims of our "loose cannon on deck" Governor who initiated this 2% cut in the Ohio schools contribution rate to the State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio.

You see, the plan submitted to the Ohio Retirement Study Council (ORSC) by Ohio STRS for a 30 year funding period did not include decisions based upon actuarial information of this Kasich 2% cut to STRS and SERS AND (as you forgot to mention) this 2% cut did not include actuarial information re. the tens of thousands of retired educators and school support personnel, many of whom are not healthy enough to go out and find a job for additional incomes at their ages.

You see, not only has our uninformed Governor neglected to consider that with this 2% gift to the schools...... even more moneys will have to be found to pay the retirement checks for those currently retired. The STRS submitted plan to the ORSC of a 1% COLA cut is even in jeopardy (of rising) to those who are in the twilight of their lives and are unable to plan for this unkind cut. This cut will also impact their already exorbitant healthcare rates as only 1% of the employer (school) contribution to STRS currently goes for healthcare expenses for retirees....that is a full 3% less than OPERS directs to their healthcare program from their employers' contribution that will remain untouched. The elderly retirees just can't afford another hit and Kasich shows no sympathy or understanding of this fact.

Jessica, as it stands now, my cost for an 80/20 PPO health plan (through STRS) is over $1,300 per month. Had I retired with the same service years (30) the same plan from OPERS would be only $80.....that is the same plan that Kasich will one day be eligible for...if he stays in politics long enough (that is doubtful). However, since Kasich is an "elected official," he can "game the system" and retire with full benefits with OPERS with a little over 21 years of service as OPERS offers elected officials the luxury of purchasing an additional .35 years of service for every year in elected office and....at an 80% discount (the 80% is subsidized by OPERS) rate. Of course, Kasich won't tell you about that, will he? Ask OPERS, they will!

John Curry - a retired educator of Ohio's public schools

Vice President of CORE (Concerned Ohio Retired Educators)

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20110408/NEWS01/104090323/Districts-Pension-changes-don-t-solve-problem?odyssey=tab%7Ctopnews%7Ctext%7CFRONTPAGE

Districts: Pension changes don't solve problem

Gov. John Kasich's office said this week that pension changes included in his recent budget proposal will save Ohio school districts $229 million annually.

Cincinnati Enquirer, April 8, 2011
By Jessica Brown
jlbrown@enquirer.com

Local savings under the plan

These five local districts would save the most under the pension changes included in Gov. John Kasich's proposed biennium budget.
...Cincinnati: $5 million
...Lakota: $2.2 million
...Mason: $1.3 million
...Hamilton: 1.1 million
...Northwest: $1.1 million
Source: Ohio's Office of Budget and Management

Gov. John Kasich's office said this week that pension changes included in his biennium budget proposal will save Ohio school districts $229 million annually.

However, that's not a lot of comfort to districts getting slammed by cuts elsewhere in Kasich's education budget.

The pension changes, which shift more costs onto employees, also are not sitting well with the unions. The changes will force teachers to shell out more toward their pensions in order to save their district some money.

• Data Center: Pension changes in your district

"The proposal represents a 2 percent pay cut to all of our public employees and will hurt the pension solvency," said Michele Prater, spokeswoman for the Ohio Education Association, which represents 128,000 teachers, faculty members and support staff at Ohio's public schools, colleges and universities.

"We support a balanced approach to the pension plan. We believe everyone should be part of the solution. But the active employees shouldn't have to have their contributions increased in order for the employer to pay less. This doesn't do anything to solve the problem."

Kasich's budget, which will be finalized by June 30, proposes that government employees contribute an additional 2 percent of their salaries toward their pensions. It simultaneously calls for government employers to contribute 2 percent less.

Ohio law currently calls for 24 percent of government employees' salaries to go into their pension fund. Employers pay 14 percent and employees pay 10 percent -although some union contracts specify higher employer payments.

Kasich's proposal would increase the employee's contribution and reduce the employer's contribution so both parties are paying 12 percent.

Kasich's office released estimates Thursday of how much school districts would save based on 2009-10 school-year data from the State Teachers Retirement System and the School Employees Retirement System.

As a group, Southwest Ohio school districts could save $31 million annually from the pension change.

But that doesn't make up for other state losses.

Districts in Southwest Ohio will lose a collective $90 million in other state revenue next fiscal year and another $14 million in the 2013 fiscal year.

Most of the losses stem from federal stimulus dollars drying up and from Kasich speeding up the phase-out of a tax on businesses' commercial equipment.

While the pension change will help, districts are still impacted.

"It will probably help mitigate the damage, but we've already built that into our budget picture next year," said Jeff Weir, superintendent of Williamsburg schools in Clermont County. His roughly 1,000-student district's plans to cut its budget by 12 to 13 percent next year.

The state education cuts contributed to already mounting financial woes for many districts. Princeton City Schools, which is being hit hard by the tax phase-out, laid off 110 workers this week - about 13 percent of its workforce. Those layoffs included 70 teachers.

"Gov. Kasich's approach in balancing the budget through the reductions in funding to schools like Princeton is just simply devastating," said Alan Bates, president of the district's 394-member teachers' union. "It's not an issue that Princeton created it's an issue that the governor created and I don't think he has a sense of the impact he's having on education."

Princeton could save about $1 million through the pension changes.

The pension changes wouldn't take effect until after current union contracts expire. So Cincinnati Public Schools, which would save $5 million annually under the change - $3.5 million of which would go toward operations - won't start seeing that savings until after its contract expires in three years. Princeton just passed a three-year contract with its non-certified employees and is at an impasse in negotiations with its teachers union, which is where the bulk of the potential pension savings would come from.