From Bob Buerkle
May 10, 2017
To all STRS Retirees and active teachers,
When STRS held a March, 2017 informational meeting in Cincinnati, Nick
Treneff and Gary Russell told the audience that STRS was still considered a "Top
Quartile" pension system. NO WAY JOSÉ!
That boat shipped out on 01/07/2013 when the Ohio Legislature gave STRS the
authority to eliminate our COLA.
STRS is now back to treating our money as if it was theirs again. They want
to fund their ideas, not deliver on the pensions they promised. That is exactly
what got STRS Director Herb Dyer fired in 2003. Dyer
wrote a retiree saying “the pension system’s money is the Board’s money to spend
as they see fit,” and “perhaps retirees should go out to dinner less often.” A
few months before this time Dyer spoke at a meeting in Cincinnati covering his
infamous leaky bucket of health care funds. That time he suggested to the
audience that they "should consider downsizing from a Cadillac to a
Chevy".
We did not expect to buy Cadillacs in the future, since few of us
bought them when we were working. Instead of STRS Management telling us to how
to manage our finances after they have ravaged them, let's put the real problem
out there. STRS keeps losing more of our money, our finances! "I say,
Just invest our money in the various indexes that historically have always
returned over 8% over 30 year periods. That is the only requirement necessary
so STRS can fulfill the retirement promise that was made to us. That is STRS'
most important job! That's what you are employed to do, and at our expense".
Remember, it is our money not yours. You are supposed to be our Fiduciary and
deliver the Benefit what was codified and Defined by law when we
accumulated our benefits while working, and which were specified by law when we
retired.
STRS Management and the Board have now stolen over 25 Billion dollars
of our promised pension benefits in their two money grabs. It is our money but
they think they can do what they want with it by telling us that this is what
they need to do to provide assurance that STRS will be able to pay future
benefits. That's hogwash! This is a smoke and mirrors game by management and it
is not what the retirees and current members need or want.
After the first 13 Billion Dollar grab in 2014 no lawsuits were filed
by any Union, any Organization, any Individuals or any Class Action Lawyers.
Emboldened by this non-reaction to the STRS pension takeaways, they looked ahead
to other takeaway ideas, describing them as "necessary to be able to pay future
pension benefits". So in February, 2015 the STRS Board voted to adopt a
"30 Year Closed Amortization Funding Period". This is costing
Billions of your pension dollars to implement and it was not necessary. This is
a lofty goal but should only be attempted when it could be achieved without
destroying retiree pensions. A good year that this could have started would have
been in 2000 when STRS had a funding ratio already at 92%. In 2017 STRS is in no
position to start a 30 year closed funding program when we have a funded ratio
standing at only 69%. All they are doing is stealing our money to fund
their project. This is something that STRS Management wants to do for
their own self desire and self aggrandizement. It is not what retirees need,
it's what STRS wanted to do with your money, not what you wanted and not what
you needed!
It is also not a Legislative Mandate. And if "Closed Funding" is so
great, why doesn't OPERS do the same thing for their members and retirees? OUR
STRS EMPLOYEES ARE IN THE OPERS RETIREMENT SYSTEM. WHY DON'T THEY RAISE THE
ROOF OVER THIS NOT BEING DONE FOR THEIR OWN PENSION SYSTEM? WHY DON'T
LEGISLATORS FORCE THEIR OWN PENSION SYSTEM TO DO THIS FOR THEM? AFTER ALL YOU
KNOW, THIS "30 YEAR CLOSED FUNDING PERIOD" IS ALL THE RAGE NOW! The path chosen
by the STRS Board and Management is not mandated and should be shelved
for now.
STRS already had the tools to deal with 30+ year unfunded periods like
they used in the 1980's, 1990's and through 2006. Then STRS management came up
with a plan in 2010-11 to seek legislative authority to reduce and/or eliminate
our COLA. That is so much easier than writing those time consuming annual
letters to the Ohio Retirement Study Council explaining how STRS will get back
under a 30 year funding period over a period of years. By the way, this process
was followed many, many times in the past and STRS was always able to work their
way back under 30 years of funding and this is still the Legislative
Mandate. One of the most recent periods occurred after the 2001 recession. STRS
wrote their plan each year. In 2005 the plan that was written to work our way
back under 30 years of unfunded liability by 2020. Instead of taking 15 years to
achieve this it was accomplished in just two years and by 06/30/2007 the
unfunded period was reduced from 42 years to 26.2 years.
We should demand that no more unnecessary and non-mandated ideas be
implemented until all lost pension benefits are repaid to retirees and restored
for current workers.
Bob Buerkle
