Findings from TUA’s pension project on Louisville, Kentucky, are featured in this article at the Courier-Journal.
Members of Taxpayers United of America, a national taxpayer watchdog group, made several stops in Kentucky Tuesday to spread their belief that the amount of pension payouts to individual government workers should be available for public scrutiny and that reform is needed to keep the system from going broke.
Christina Tobin, vice president of the organization that was founded by her father, one-time Illinois libertarian gubernatorial candidate Jim Tobin, said the public has a right to know pension costs just as government salaries are considered a public record.
Tobin also distributed a list of estimated pensions for some of Louisville metro government’s top officials, and a list of estimated state pension payouts.
The lists make a number of assumptions, such as each employee will retire after 30 years of service at age 52, have a cost of living increase of 2 percent per year, and that their current salaries are an average over several years.
Those assumptions make individual predictions invalid in most cases, but the list does show that some metro government employees can qualify for pensions as high as $168,000 a year under those conditions. State pensions on the list reach as high as $256,000 annually.
Tobin said that compares with an average annual wage of $45,000 in Kentucky.
“We are sensing taxpayers are not happy and they don’t think it’s fair,” Tobin said of the large pension payouts. “There needs to be transparency and reform.”
Specifically, the group wants to change the system so that individuals contribute more to their own pensions.
The Kentucky Retirement Systems board in November called for higher individual contributions to the state employee pension programs next year, even as lawmakers are not expected to fully fund benefits amid continuing budget problems. An independent actuary report to KRS trustees on Thursday showed that unfunded pension and insurance liabilities for the state have ballooned to more than $12 billion this fiscal year and that drastic increases in the state’s contribution rates are needed to fully fund retirement obligations in fiscal year 2012-13, which begins July 1.
Pension costs for municipal employees have risen dramatically in recent years, as well. But unlike the state system, city and county governments receive a bill every year that must be paid, which means that system is well funded.
Louisville paid about $70 million in pension costs this year.
Chris Poynter, a spokesman for Mayor Greg Fischer, agreed that the system needs to change.
“That’s a debate we at city government have been having for several years now,” Poynter said. “We’ve got to do something with pension costs, because cities can no longer afford the bill without significant cuts in other areas.”
Tobin said she hopes Kentucky’s legislature will change the law to make pension payments a public record, but said her group will launch a grass-roots campaign to try to force the issue if that doesn’t happen.
Currently, the public can only get information about individual pension payouts if the recipient agrees to allow the release of the information, Tobin said.
The following news item from ABC 7 features TUA’s lawsuit against the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority.
December 20, 2011 (CHICAGO) (WLS) — A judge allowed the tollway authority to go ahead with a massive hike in fees Tuesday. On January 1, 2012, the average Illinois Tollway fare will nearly double.
These days most drivers don’t even have to slow down to pay a toll. But soon, the cost may have drivers hitting the brakes.
“I go through three tolls on the way to work and three on the way home. That’s six total. It adds up,” said driver Husam Nofal.
“The cost is $5 in some places for trucks, almost $2 for cars. Diesel fuel, everything is going up,” said truck driver Will Grinstead. “It really makes it rough. You want to find alternate routes. People will go around the tolls.”
A last ditch effort by a taxpayer watchdog group to get not just the toll hike but the toll road itself declared illegal failed Tuesday when a judge tossed out the case.
“The Tollways were never intended to be permanent,” said Andrew Spiegel, Taxpayers United of America.
Taxpayers United argued that the 1953 law that created the toll authority specifically said Tollways would become freeways after the initial bonds were paid off. But there was one problem with that argument.
“What’s not in the statute and what has never been in the state statute is a date when that is supposed to happen,” said Spiegel.
Starting January 1, 2012 I-PASS users will see their typical tolls go from 40 to 75 cents. Paying a toll in cash will increase from 80 cents to $1.50.
The toll authority’s own website calls the freeway promise “well intended, but shortsighted.” It states simply: “there is no such thing as a free road.” And some drivers agree.
“Forty percent of my local are out of work right now. I’d like to see more construction coming for Illinois…if it puts more people back to work,” said Kevin Keane, driver and union member.
The toll authority plans to spend $12 billion over the next 15 years updating roads.
One point seven million dollars gets thrown into toll buckets every day in Illinois.
(Copyright ©2011 WLS-TV/DT. All Rights Reserved.)
Click here to view as a PDF Click here to view $100,000-plus salaries each year from tolls
CHICAGO–Taxpayers United of America (TUA) President Jim Tobin called Tuesday’s hearing of his lawsuit against the Illinois Tollway Authority a “spectacle,” and labeled Judge Rita Novak’s decision yesterday rejecting an attempt to block the 90% percent tollway tax hike scheduled to go into effect Jan. 1 a “callous, politically-driven decision.”
“Novak essentially gave tollway customers, as well as the law, no consideration,” said Tobin.
Novak dismissed a lawsuit challenging the tollway’s authority to raise tolls.
“The hearing was a spectacle,” said Tobin. “Tollway users were represented by noted attorney Andrew Spiegel, and State Attorney General Lisa Madigan (D) must have been worried, because she had six — that’s right — six of her taxpayer paid staff there to represent the Tollway Authority.”
Attorney General Lisa Madigan is the daughter of powerful Illinois House Speaker Michael J. Madigan (D-22, Chicago). (Read more…) →
