Robin Rayfield to STRS Board: The election taking place currently will be a referendum on the management team

STRS Comments April 2022

Greetings STRS Board Members:

My name is Robin Rayfield. I serve as the executive director of the Ohio Retired Teachers Association representing thousands of STRS beneficiaries. I am a STRS retiree having retired in 2011 with over 30 years of service.

I would like to offer my thanks and appreciation for the action taken by the STRS board last month increasing the benefits of many STRS retirees and eliminating the age requirement for active educators.

As you are no doubt aware, there are conflicting reports that have been circulated about the ‘performance’ of STRS. Many retirees have expressed disappointment in the performance of STRS, while STRS reports that our pension system is a top tier pension system. The disconnect here is with who is reporting. If retirees think the system is not performing well and the consultants that are paid to say nice things tell us that we are performing well, how do we really measure the performance of STRS?

Here are a few metrics that I would suggest for determining if the performance of STRS is worthy of praise:

1. Did the pension pay its obligations? Did retirees get what they were promised at retirement (including COLA)?

2. Do active educators have a normal cost (or value) that is greater than their contribution rate?

3. Do all of our investments exceed a simple, clear, external benchmark after all expenses associated with the investments are accounted for?

4. Are members satisfied with the management of our pension?

If the answers to any of the questions indicate that our system is not a top tier pension system, then none of the employees should receive performance-based incentives. The level of trust between the retirees and STRS management is not high. I hope you recognize that the low level of trust is due to the way our pension system has been managed.

The election taking place currently will be a referendum on the management team.