Retirees home in on the grim news.....

"Can you believe that we will never get a cost of living increase again? Retirees like me with only the STRS pension are going to be cooked. I may have  in a few years no choice but to commit suicide. Boy it sure would be horrible to ask actives with salaries we could have only dreamed about to pay more. We have nobody standing up for us.  My God Where is OEA or ORTA?  I guess I should just hurry up and die. That is now the STRS plan. Next I suppose they will take away my healthcare. My God, when will this stop?" 

*    *    *

 "This is a grim, disturbing, and devastating development. (X) paints a picture that is horrifyingly close to the reality that many retirees, especially those who retired prior to 1999, face. The loss of Medicare reimbursement coupled with this COLA cut are a blow to our financial welfare. There's no doubt that the next blow will come in the form of drastic health care changes. (X) and other members/leaders of CORE fought valiantly for ten years to stop this sort of debacle. They supported Dr. Dennis Leone and John Lazarus in their efforts to clean up the STRS Board and make them accountable to retirees even in the face of scorn and personal defamation at the hands of OEA and ORTA. Where is the new generation of retirees who are willing to stand in the gap and speak out against the draconian actions of the present STRS Board? I will repeat yet again that there should be at STRS an immediate freeze on all hiring, salary increases and bonuses until the COLA is restored for retirees."

*    *    *

"I believe the following statements are all accurate.

Retirees are the ones paying for STRS Investment mistakes

No usual and ongoing demographic changes caused this problem 

The 3% simple COLA did not cause this problem

No service formula benefits of any kind caused this problem, including the 88.5% for 35 years

The combined effect of all of the above did not cause this problem

ONLY EXTREME LOSSES BY IN-HOUSE STRS INVESTMENT EXPERTS CAUSED THIS CRISIS" 
(From Bob Buerkle)