We can’t do anything at a local level about already promised pensions, unless the Village wants to challenge final salary calculations used for pensions. We can move all new hires to 403(b) defined contribution plans and ask them to contribute more than 10% of their pay towards their pension. The state pension fund could file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy if their assets are insufficient to meet their obligations. It’s slowing the rate of growth that matters the most, taxpayers are already on the hook for $100bn of unfunded promises made to NJ municipal retirees.
NJ Accrued Pension Liability highest to lowest
Teachers Pension – TPAF Accrued Liability $51.405 Billion Dollars
Municipal Workers – PERS Accrued Liability $45.393 Billion Dollars
Police & Fire Pension -PFRS Accrued Liability $31.732 Billion Dollars
Page 13 from the NJ Pension study Report dated January 2014
Can the reader answer why the pension system is failing. Does he know the whole story. The employees have never missed making there payments. The towns made there payments up to the time they were granted a furlough. It’s failing because previous governors raided the system to balance state budgets and to give tax rebates. It’s not because its mismanaged because police/fire watch over there own system. It failing because of mismanagement from our elected officials.
Do we have a $60 billion unfunded healthcare liability because the governors raided the system ? No. All pensioners have lost so far is COLAs. You’ve never missed a check. And it wasn’t just elected officials. Did you ever ask who was paying for your free healthcare until 2009 ? Or who was subsidizing your $20 per month healthcare contributions and $15 drug co-pays since then ? You just took whatever the union negotiated for you without asking questions. A pure gravy train. Now that taxpayers are asking questions about all of these promises made, and you’re quick to blame everyone else.
The above is a repost of an earlier thread, you cannot put new hires into a 403 style pension, state law says other wise. The pension shortfalls were created by previous goveners the same taxpayers who reaped the benefits of the pension holiday are now screaming about paying back. The current Gov. who screamed pension reform just gave back a large portion of the savings by allowing local governments to skip 116 million in pension payments but the fac or tiglet team” screams unsustainable pension benefits”
‘ if this is the case then force Gov crispy crème to put the money back in the fund where it belongs and never should have been removed from in the first place
# 2 said, …. Do we have a $60 billion unfunded healthcare liability because the governors raided the system ?
Ok #2, I am ready to listen! How about you tell us all about the Health care benefits history for the Village of Ridgewood and the state of NJ. If you are so well informed this should be easy for you.
Charlie the benefits you dislike so much were negotiated for honestly and or won in binding arbitration. The rising cost of health care lies with the vendors not the employees, but it’s easier to come after the working man than to regulate a corporation that you and your clients and politicians may be heavily invested in. Lastly to the best of my knowledge unions have to ratify contracts by their memberships I don’t know if the cops or firemen do it this way but teamsters and twu do it and no contract goes into effect without ratification. A “gravy train” I don’t think so, explain the reason for pension shortfalls is not playing the blame game it’s relaying correct information.
The arguments about how this all came about are utterly pointless. It’s kind of like saying I bought my house and took out a 30-year mortgage. Everything was above board and agreed. I then lost my job.
As I said before, the money is NOT THERE. There will not be a federal bailout because the same problem exists in a lot of other parts of the country and it’s simply too big to bailout. You cannot liken it to the bailouts of GM and the banks. They paid it back. A pension bailout could not be paid back.
Hey number 2. So I still live in town. I have no children in the school system since 2006. How long have you lived in the village. I’ve been paying school taxes from 2006 to present. Hmmm maybe I deserve a rebate
#2 I’ve lived in town since 1956, my child graduated RHS 1976, I still pay school tax. When I think I’ve had enough I’ll move, why don’t you do the same instead of bleating about costs and demanding everyone else get less so you can have more.
# 6 said…..”The arguments about how this all came about are utterly pointless.”
Interesting you think that way.
Aren’t you the same person who was blaming the public sector workers and their unions for the pension system financial mess that you labeled a huge “HOLE”!
That is until I proved to you that the public sector employees were NOT to blame for the pension “HOLE” and the NJ legislature and past governors were the cause of the problem.
Then you didn’t want to talk about that issue any more and you jumped to health care.
So now you don’t want to hear about the health care history because you want to blame Unions and public sector employees for the problem. Why do you want to assign blame to the wrong people? What is your agenda here?
No, that wasn’t me. But you do seem to be taking some undeserved credit for having “proved” that the workers were not to blame. Again, this is pointless. It’s like having an argument about who and what caused the big recession that we have been in for several years. We all just end up chasing shadows. I have zero agenda. I lost a fortune in the crash of 2008 and it’s never coming back. I’m merely being realistic about where things go from here. The country as a whole has massive financial problems and the biggest problem in all of it is managing everyones expectations regarding the future. Politicians won’t be honest with you because, like they say we “can’t handle the truth”. It might seem like kicking the can down thr road, but in order to prevent riots and mass depression from taking shape, kicking the can down the road is simply a way of very slowly getting people to understand that the life and future they imagined is no longer there. It sucks, right?
tell that to the police and fire crews.
I am sorry to hear you lost a “fortune” in the 2008 crash. I am not sure what happened in your situation. Clearly anyone who was invested in the market saw their investments fall by more than 50% of their pre 2008 value at the market low on March 9, 2009. However if they remained invested they saw the value of their investment recover and surpass their pre 2008 value last year. Sounds like for some reason you had to sell some or all of your investments while the market was down. Painful I an sure.
I share your concern about the financial state of the country, states and communities. The only political group (they are not an official party) the tea party has been trying to impress on both Democrats and Republicans the danger of having a 17 Trillion national debt. The Democrats and many republicans say it is not a problem to have so much debt but nothing can be further from the truth. Imagine what will happen when the interest rates go back up and we are still borrowing 40 cents of every dollar we spend in the Federal Budget. At some point the interest alone will be more then we spend on any other item in the budget. The tea party is the only group sounding this alarm.
I don’t have the answers, I suspect the fix will require a combination of cuts in spending in all budgets in all government agencies combined with increases in taxes and growth of the economy which will generate more wealth and thereby taxes. I personally believe we could solve this problem as a country by tapping our natural resource, Oil, through drilling and fracking. This would permit the country to be energy independent while creating jobs (some paying well into the $100,000.00 range) and lowering the cost for energy, just to name a few benefits. I don’t understand why the Keystone XL pipe line has been delayed again, It makes no sense that we can drill for the estimated 30 Billion barrels of oil up an Anwar Alaska, or why going after the estimated 400 Billion barrels of oil in California’s Montery shale which equals nearly half of ALL of the conventional oil in all of Saudi Arabia. Why should we pay other countries for energy products when we can pay our selves for the same energy products and energize our own economy, it just doesn’t make any sense to me. Could this solve all of our problems? I don’t know, but it sure couldn’t hurt.
#10, I forgot to mention this in my comment about the economy above…..
I suspect you were not reading an earlier subject here on pensions where a commenter was blaming public employees for the financial problems the state is experiencing today with pensions being way under funded. If you had I am sure you would understand my comment.
too bad.
the police and fire unions are going to stay.
I can empathize with you Declan, I lost a considerable amount of money that I had in GM stock and Bonds that became worthless when GM went bankrupt. I also had shares of FRE (Freddie Mac) that I bought at just over $63.00 per share (now symbol FMCC worth $3.90 per share) currently at a loss of over 90%. I am still doing ok though since most of my other stocks have recovered since 2008.
Yes, you are right about the mainstream media having done a very successful job of labeling the tea party as racists and right wing extremists. But slowly they are educating the younger college kids about how the federal borrowing will become their burden with no benefit for them by going to college campuses and talking with the students. The 47% who Romney spoke about during his 2012 presidential campaign will never care about the national debt since they are takers and will NEVER have to pay a dime toward that debt.
Like you I am also concerned about the future. The mid term election in November will be more important than many realize. If, as some are predicting, tea party candidates can win seats along with conservative republicans, maybe, just maybe, we can save this slowly sinking ship.
Where has anyone said they should go ? All taxpayers are asking for is meaningful concessions in the next CBAs. If new teachers can contribute to defined contribution plans, then change the law so police & fire new hires also contribute to defined contribution plans. Why is this such a hard ask ? Have all new hires pay equivalent rates to the private sector for health insurance. Have 25% co-pays like the private sector. We have to reduce the rate of growth in our liabilities somehow. Otherwise they’ll swallow up our entire budget and we’ll be left with nothing for Village services, new roads, and capital improvements. This is not out of line with what municipalities all around the country are asking for – why are your vested interests so much more important than the interests of taxpayers ?
Thanks for proving this. What’s the history on healthcare ?
Since 1995 the pensions system basically has been the employees pension system. Since that time until present the employees have never ever missed a payment or given a furlough. They now contribute 1.5% more. The money you good citizens have sent down to the state on out behalf’s have been given back to you one way or another. Tax rebates homestead rebates balancing the budget ect read this it may help you better understand it was written in 1995 ny time article
http://www.nytimes.com/…/in-america-whitma...
The money that was taken not lost like fortunes that lost in the market should be paid back. Then once paid back then let’s discuss how we move forward. It makes me sick when I hear the govenor saying our pension system is failing but doesn’t tell the wHOLE story why it’s failing
Hard to argue taxpayers have seen rebates ! Ridgewood property taxes doubled between 1997 and 2012, we have the second highest state taxes in the U.S., and when have you seen balanced budgets ? NJ has some of the worst finances of any state in the country, our debt is near junk in relative terms (just as bad as CA and IL) and what about this $60bn unfunded healthcare liability ? What is the accrued liability per employee for teachers vs police & fire ? What does “1.5% more” mean ? How much of total comp is put towards the pension ? Is that enough when the avg retirement age is 52 ? What % of the healthcare insurance premium and co-pays are covered by the employee ? It’s supposed to go to 35% in the next CBAs but is that enough ? 35% of what ?
Interesting that municipalities across the contry continue to file for bankruptcy protection after over-promising to their retirees. This is despite taxing our middle class to death. Middle income in the US is not keeping pace with growth in Canada, Britain and Sweden. The WHOLE story would also include admitting that entitlement promises have been too generous and that concessions need to be made to taxpayers going forward.
What other municipalities across the country have filed for banrupcy besides Detroit?
There have been at least 54 Chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy filings just since 2006, with the largest being Detroit, followed by Stockton, San Bernardino, and Jefferson County. Central Falls, RI and Westfall, PA are some others. Harrisburg, PA filed for bankruptcy in 2011 but the judge denied their petition. NYC based hedge fund Bridgewater did a study suggesting that roughly 85% of public pensions will go bankrupt within three decades. US public pensions have $3 trillion of assets with which they are expected to make $10 trillion of retirement payments over the next 30 yrs. This implies a required annual return of roughly 9%, vs. the current 30 year US Treasury yield of 3.44%
What do all those cities have in common with regards to pension management and funding?
Hey, if you know how to make wine from water, go ahead. The unfunded healthcare liability remains the bigger issue, what’s your answer there ? Private sector workers pay employer based costs, why shouldn’t public sector workers pay equivalent amounts ? Or just move everyone to healthcare exchanges and let them pay out of pocket.
Everyone else is “getting less” so I can have more ? That’s some serious chutzpah there, look at the facts instead of making such an uninformed statement. The only people who “get less” are the middle class and the municipal workers who got fired in 2010. Concessions to date haven’t made any difference, retirees with 20 years before 2011 still get 65% of their final three years through 2016, and healthcare contributions won’t rise to at least 35% of the premium until the next CBAs. Private sector workers don’t get COLAs, so those don’t count anyway. You expect us to get excited about a 1.5% increase in pension contributions to 10% of base wages ? Remember that every time you vists a doctor with your $5 co-pay and $15 drug co-pay, and your max $20/montyh health insurance premiums, you are stealing food from the table of taxpayers. Buon Appetito !
By your logic, private sector workers are getting hammered both ways, by paying for employer based coverage, as well as subsidizing your healthcare coverage from the same vendors… it’s the insurers fault, not the fault of the contracts that subsidize your free coverage. That’s the definition of “gravy train”. Taxpayers should demand that all municipal employees move to healthcare exchanges and pay out of pocket; it’s only fair given you make as much as the median household AND get a lifetime fixed pension as well. Explain why you need subsidized healthcare for life, too ?
I agree with you #26, the people who are getting screwed are the middle class. Take the Teachers Unions as an example, they haven’t made even one concession in this economy. I remember reading somewhere on this blog that the Teachers Union got their members a nice fat 9% increase in their pension benefits for both retired and employed teachers in 2001, along with a reduction in the amount they pay into their pensions, that is outrageous !
Add that to their nonexistent gold plated Cadillac healthcare contributions and it’s no surprise we are paying the highest property taxes in the country.
I would love to have a part-time job that pays $70,000 or more a year with a full pension and gold plated Cadillac healthcare benefits that have doctor visits with a $5 co-pay and $15 drug co-pay health insurance premiums, You are right #26 the Teachers are truly stealing food from my family and the table of taxpayers.
Yes, I agree #27 us private sector workers are getting hammered both ways. Paying Teachers a full time salary for part-time hours , as well as subsidizing their healthcare coverage and then they retire with full pensions with healthcare coverage for life WOW!
That’s the true definition of “gravy train”.
Taxpayers should demand that all Teachers move to healthcare exchanges and pay out of pocket; it’s only fair given they make a full time salary AND get a lifetime fixed pension as well.
And I would love to hear them Explain why they need subsidized healthcare for life also!
I’m a tax payer, not a teacher, if these conditions were arrived at legally we are under obligation to pay them if you don’t like the conditions of their employ move elsewhere, where the conditions are more to your liking
You just keep juking and dodging. Why ? TELL A TEACHER TO THEIR FACE THAT THEY’RE A PART-TIMER. You’ll get what you deserve. Many would argue that police & fire work in Ridgewood is part-time work with country club conditions. The pay and pensions are high only because the schools are so good, no other reason. The real work is done in Detroit, Newark, NYC, etc. Our guys use their off duty time to protect Villagers from PS&G trucks in cars paid for and field by taxpayers and complain about teachers !
Thanks. Or we change the terms of the contracts – which we will. Or fire people. Which we will. Or both.
#31 said…..”Many would argue that police & fire work in Ridgewood is part-time work with country club conditions. ”
Why are you defending and protecting teachers? Are you a teacher? You must be aware that teachers get 60 consecutive days of vacation (June and July) every year, along with EVERY weekend and holiday off right? The real teaching is done in Detroit, Newark, NYC, etc. Our teachers wouldn’t last a year there. Here they work in nice buildings with country club conditions, they have free parking, well disciplined students, no crime to speak of and the biggest problem they have is deciding where to vacation on their two plus month vacation. Oh yea and they come on this blog and complain about police and firefighters!
I DARE YOU TO TELL A POLICEMAN OR A FIREMAN TO THEIR FACE THAT THEY’RE A PART-TIMER. You’ll get what you deserve.
In fact according to the Federal Fair Labor and Standards act 7K exemption ALL policeman must work 43 hours a week before they become eligible for overtime and ALL Firefighters must work 53 hours per week before they become eligible foe overtime. Tell me again about part-time hours for police and firefighters!
I suggest you read the Federal law on Police and Firefighter work hours before you make uneducated & foolish statements like “police & fire work in Ridgewood is part-time work with country club conditions.”
You can find the law here……https://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/whdfs8.pdf
The pay and pensions for police and firefighters is well deserved because the town is safe and there are no major incidents of fire due to an aggressive fire inspection program.
#32 said….Thanks. Or we change the terms of the contracts – which we will. Or fire people. Which we will. Or both.
Not likely on both issues. You think you are going to change the terms of a legally binding contract…you have another guess coming.
And I hope you try firing someone without cause. I can’t wait to see what happens then……..
Great idea #32, lets start with the BOE by taking away the full time benefits and replace them with part time benefits and lets also start firing the highest paid non performing teachers.
So you admit we have no crime to speak of, and police only have to work 43 hours a week to qualify for OT, i.e. 8.6 hours a day. Is the town safe because we have police, or because, in general, we have a law abiding community ? No question there are no major incidents of fire due to an aggressive fire inspection program. But many in our police & fire departments get 30 days of paid vacation per year, in addition to 15 days sick leave which they get to carry over year after year up to a max of 6 months which gets paid out upon retirement. 45 days a year vs your mistaken estimate that teachers get June & July off ? Police & fire are special in that they can retire after 25 years of service, unlike teachers.
including weekends, that’s just over 6 hours a day for police and just less than 8 hours a day for fire… very few of these guys live in Ridgewood. And we know the OT budget for both departments is massive and will only get worse with mass retirements in 2014. Many private sector workers commuting to NYC work 60 hour weeks, bring their work home on weekends, and spend 15 hours a week commuting. They volunteer in the Village at night and weekends. They do this only because they want a backyard in a real community with good schools.
So you admit we have no crime to speak of, and police only have to work 43 hours a week to qualify for OT, i.e. 8.6 hours a day. Is the town safe because we have police, or because, in general, we have a law abiding community ?
Yes, I admit we have no crime to speak of because the Police do a great job! The town safe because we have a well equipped and trained professional police department.
You mention our police & fire departments get 30 days of paid vacation per year. But you ignore the fact that they work 365 days a year vs a normal work week that is 260 days a year.
How many days off do our teachers get? The last time I checked the school year is 180 days long. Now we all know teachers do not work on weekends or holidays, so if we take 180 days and say that they work 9 hours a day that totals up to 1620 hours per year. Someone working a part time job working 6 hours per day 5 days a week would work a total of 1560. So tell me again, why are we giving teachers full time benefits and pay with a pension for part time work?
#37 said….. very few of these guys (Police & Firefighters) live in Ridgewood.
How many of our teachers live in Ridgewood? Half of them? I bet more like 1/4 of them.
You claim the public safety overtime budgets are massive. How much are those overtime budgets, do you even know? Why should the overtime budgets get bigger with retirements in 2014? Are you suggesting the town will not be hiring new employees to replace the retiring public safety employees?
#39 told there are I’ve been told there are 7 members of the PD eligible to retire in 2015, all those eligible to go are going. It takes a almost a year to get a cop trained and on the road. If the town doesn’t start the hiring process there will be a serious lapse in manpower. Causing shortages in staffing as the ranks have been cut already.
I guess you didn’t see the budget yet or listen to the department budget request presentations ? It’s supposed to take a year to train a cop before they can contribute, so 7 retirees vs. less new hires so far means Public safety will be at risk in 2015, and OT will increase, yes.