Trina Kay Prufer: A Public Retirement System Cannot Work for Members if it is Designed to Fail

By Trina Kay Prufer

July 19, 2025

A Public Retirement System Cannot Work for Members if it is Designed to Fail

"STRS is a failure because RULES and LAWS did not apply to the STRS system. STRS was allowed to spend itself into enormous debt. Laws were re-written (2012 “reform“ legislation) transferring this debt onto members. This was all by design."

By looking at the total picture of STRS as a public retirement system, it will never live up to its name. It loses money every day. That is by design.

A retirement system can only fulfill its obligations if the underlying financial structure pays for benefits. STRS cannot do this because its input ( employer + employee + investment income) is less than outflow. The losses turn into debt, and the interest on the debt is enormous. Adding insult to injury, management costs are treated as if they have nothing to do with outflow (the “drop in the bucket” rational). WASTE is everywhere.

Retired teachers must live on a diminishing benefit, even though their invested contributions continue to make money for the system. Those who work for the system prosper. STRS cannot or will not pay what it owes to retirees, and the law allows this to happen. In essence, STRS is a state-run scam.

What does a healthy, normal public retirement system look like? It is actuarially sound. The law protects the benefit in effect at the TIME of retirement. The benefit is PRE-FUNDED. Promises are kept. There is real oversight. The KEY element is that the state underwrites the benefit, assuring there is a mechanism for monitoring the system, and the system is run for the benefit of members.

If the above sounds familiar… just read the pre-2012 ORC and plan booklets provided to these same retirees. It’s all there...however, these essential protections were conveniently ignored.

STRS is a failure because RULES and LAWS did not apply to the STRS system. STRS was allowed to spend itself into enormous debt. Laws were re-written (2012 “reform“ legislation) transferring this debt onto members. This was all by design.

Whistle-blower suicides at STRS? Who knows for sure, but they're on our radar again.

Original post date: July 15, 2005

Link to two articles in one post: https://kathiebracy.blogspot.com/2012/07/woman-falls-to-her-death-at-strs.html

Comments made from one STRS member to another, 07/15/2025: 

"Oh, did you read the article? This took place at the STRS building on Broad Street in Columbus [in 2012]. This woman is said to have been blowing a whistle on happenings at STRS. This woman's family was paid a settlement by STRS to not talk about anything. Truth. That is not hearsay. 

"She is not the only whistle-blower employee to have a questionable death at STRS on Broad Street. There is another associated with the parking garage. Yup. I cannot make this stuff up." (No source cited.)

Trina Kay Prufer: Does STRS have a Humanitarian Purpose?

Froom Trina Prufer

July 15, 2025

The truth is… STRS is a detriment to its members and a cautionary tale to all other public workers and pension systems in the nation. The State of Ohio needs to face this reality and rectify the injustice. Disseminating disinformation to the media, filing phony lawsuits and changing the composition of the board only intensifies the problem. A public pension system is only as strong as the laws protecting its members. Otherwise, it just turns into a scam.

Does STRS have a Humanitarian Purpose?

STRS was founded in 1919 to provide teachers with a secure and dignified retirement as compensation for their dedication to Ohio’s children. Ohio could be proud in that it was one of the first in the nation to have created an actuarially sound pension system PROTECTING its teachers from poverty.

The very CORE of the financial model was the pre-funding of the benefit, so there was NO RISK to members. A promise made was a promise kept… that was until 2012, when “ reform” legislation passed, turning the original funding model upside down.

Today, STRS is the WORST example of what happens when a public retirement system goes bad. From a humanitarian perspective, hard working public servants, who were promised retirement security throughout the lifespan, were double-crossed. Ohio’s retirees, survivors and the disabled were left with a benefit that significantly diminishes over time; additionally, Ohio’s active teachers pay more into the system than the defined-benefit is worth. In effect, the system eats its own.

So, what is the humanitarian purpose of STRS? Does it have any benefit to society? What happens to a cohort of aging public teachers when they are cheated by their own government?

The truth is… STRS is a detriment to its members and a cautionary tale to all other public workers and pension systems in the nation. The State of Ohio needs to face this reality and rectify the injustice. Disseminating disinformation to the media, filing phony lawsuits and changing the composition of the board only intensifies the problem. A public pension system is only as strong as the laws protecting its members. Otherwise, it just turns into a scam.