Tax Accountability’s endorsement of Ron Paul for U.S. President was featured on RonPaul2012.com.
LAKE JACKSON, Texas – 2012 Republican Presidential candidate Ron Paul was endorsed yesterday by Tax Accountability of TAC, a Chicago-based national taxpayer watchdog organization. Tax Accountability is the political action arm of Taxpayers United of America (TUA). Founded in 1976, TUA is one of the largest taxpayer organizations in the nation.
The group’s president Jim Tobin wrote a ringing endorsement of the 12-term Congressman from Texas, who is the only candidate forthright about the constitutional and philosophical antipathy toward using the police powers of government to take the fruits of one person’s labor and distribute it to another as a condition of citizenship.
Findings from TUA’s pension project on Wichita, Kansas, are featured in this story from KSN News Wichita.
WICHITA, Kansas (KSN) — A grassroots group took their message of pension reform to Wichita hoping to shock citizens into action by releasing some stunning figures showing their estimates of what some city employees will make during their retirements from government pensions.
“We do intend to sensationalize the numbers and we do intend to outrage taxpayers,” said Raeann McNeilly with Taxpayers United of America.
McNeilly and the organizations vice president, Christina Tobin, have been traveling the nation by car and stopping in cities like Wichita with their message of pension reform. They say it’s the top challenge facing states looking to balance their budgets.
“This is serious,” said Tobin. “This means these checks will stop coming if we don’t have real reform here in Kansas.”
Pension reform was a goal of the legislature this year in Topeka but efforts to reform KPERS have stalled.
They were also critical of Kansas officials for refusing to release the firm figures on pensions. Taxpayers United used salary figures from 2010 to estimate what city employees will make in pensions based on a life expectancy of 85.
“They release the pension numbers but not the names next to the pensions”, Tobin complained. “It’s the first state we’ve ever encountered like this.”
A spokesperson for City Hall says the numbers provided by Taxpayers United are “generally misleading, taken out of context and in some cases inaccurate”.
Findings from TUA’s pension project on Wichita, Kansas, are featured in this story from KWCH 12 Eyewitness News.
(WICHITA, Kan.)—Wichita City Manager Robert Layton, Police Chief Norman Williams, and Fire Chief Ron Blackwell are a just a few of the city employees Taxpayers United of America use as examples.The group, based in Chicago, was in Wichita Thursday to bring awareness to public pension funds.
It wants the current system changed so new public employees pay into a private retirement system and current employees pay more into the system which it says is unsustainable.
“We want all of the current employees to put more in…10 percent more. If they don’t the system will collapse and they will get nothing,” says Christina Tobin with Taxpayers United of America.
The group lists the top 25 “estimated” pensions of city, county, and state employees. It wants Kansas to release the actual pension amounts of current and retired employees.
“We’re here to shed a light on the need for transparency in Kansas.” says Tobin.
Tobin says the group can only estimate pensions based on the state formula and 2010 salaries.
“We’re here to urge Governor Brownback to release the pensions with the names.”
The group would not disclose its donors.
It says it names employees to get attention and admits the numbers are only estimates and are at the high end.
“If I don’t see the names with the numbers I can’t relate to what they meet. Yes, we do intend to sensationalize the numbers and we intend to outrage taxpayers. It’s the outrage with taxpayers that’s going to cause them to contact legislators and bring about change,” Rae Ann McNeilly, director of outreach with Taxpayers United of America.
It says it wants to introduce legislation in Kansas to change the current formula, but says it’s still searching for a lawmaker to sponsor the bill.
Attached are links of public employee salaries and estimates by Taxpayers United. The group says it did not attempt to contact any of the employees on the list.
Below are formulas used by the group to estimate pensions:
For non-police/fire
((2010 Gross x 0.6125) x (24 years)
For police and fire
((2010 Gross x .80) x (30 years)
