Thirteen years ago, a minor political miracle occurred in the Capitol of California.
A legislature dominated by the Democrats adopted and a Democratic Governor, Jerry Brown, has signed a significant overhaul of public and local pension systems.
It was a miracle because the reform was universally opposed by the unions of public employees, which were and are still the most powerful political interests of the Capitol with long -standing ties with the Democrats.
The overhaul, defended by Brown, concluded the law because the State was then recovering from a very serious recession which had devastated government finances, and retirement obligations – which had been widely widened during the Gray Davis government to the previous one – had become an unbearable burden.
Compulsory retirement payments in the California public employee retirement system had been factors in the bankruptcy of two cities, and the non -financed obligations for future benefits totaled tens of billions of dollars.
The legislation has closed the advantages, an increase in retirement ages, blocked maneuvers that have artificially increased certain pensions, created a two -level system that maintained advantages for current workers but limited them for future hires and forced workers to pay for at least half of the retirement costs.
“This is the greatest decline for public retirement services in the history of Californian pensions,” said Brown by signing the bill. “We reduce the advantages of what they were before being governor for the first time and reducing costs up to $ 55 billion in PAN and billions of others in other local retirement systems. Under new rules, employers and employees will contribute their fair share of costs, which leads to a more sustainable system. ”
Unsurprisingly, some unions have challenged the aspects of the reform, in particular those who prohibit maneuvers from sending pensions, but Brown retaliated and won before the Supreme Court of the State. However, the court refused to take another step than Brown sought, eliminating the “Californian rule” which prohibits the reduction in the benefits of workers once they are registered in the system.
This piece of political history constitutes the context of new legislation which, if it, if it, if it is adopted by the Legislative Assembly and signed by Governor Gavin News, would begin to cancel what the 2012 reform did.
The member of the Assembly Catherine Stefani, a Democrat in San Francisco, has the legislation, Bill 569 of the Assembly, which would repeal one of the main provisions of the reform prohibiting local governments from promulgating “additional retirement services” for their workers.
Stefani and Teamsters Union, the measurement sponsor, argue that Brown reform leaves workers without sufficient retirement benefits to compensate for the notoriously high costs of California and makes local governments difficult to fill the vacancies.
“This simply gives local governments and their employees another option at the negotiating table, which could make the difference between losing or keeping a talented worker,” Stefani told the public employment and retirement of the assembly last week.
The bill crossed the committee on a vote of 7-0, including the two Republicans of the Committee, Tom Lackey and Juan Alanis, who are both former police officers.
Although the defenders of the bill say that it would be simply permissive, giving local governments the possibility of increasing the advantages, its practical effect would be to prohibit one of the most important guarantees of the reform. He would restore the capacity of local government unions to exercise political pressures on municipal councils, the county’s supervisory board and other local officials to extend the benefits for workers who have been hired since the promulgation of the reform, a painful point for unions for a long time.
It is surprising that such a major change in pension law will begin to move in the process without, so far, no opposition or even comment from the local governments it would affect.
Dan Walters is a calm columnist.
California Daily Newspapers
