Recently, NJEA has been hearing rumblings from the Statehouse that lead us to believe that we will likely be facing a resurgence in attgacks on public employee retirement benefits.

You may recall that during Governor Corzine’s town hall meetings on asset monetization of the toll roads most speakers asked the Governor to make deeper cuts in the state budget.

According to an April 15, 2008 Star Ledger article. Legislators are considering reviving certain aspects of the Special Legislative Session. In particular, the article referenced:

Other proposals under consideration:

We know that tiering benefits for new hires creates a hostile work environment. It is bad public policy to provide different levels of compensation and benefits for employees doing the same work.

Some of these changes target our lowest-paid members who rely on these benefits. Studies have shown that pension and health benefits are critical to attacking a high-quality workforce. Without these benefits, districts will find it more difficult to attract and retain quality staff.

In addition, these changes will not balance the state budget, as any savings would not occur for many years.

Finally, none of these changes would curtail the problems identified by the State Committee of Investigation (SCI). For example, tacking and boosting by public officials would not be eliminated.

While no legislation has been introduced yet, it is currently being drafted.

We anticipate that once the legislation has been draftged, the Senate will move quickly.

NJEA is organizing lobby days that will be held in Trenton on: Monday, May 19; Thursday, June 5; Thursday, June 12; Monday, June 16; and Thursday, June 19. NJEA also will hold local meetings with all legislators to discuss this issue.

Although most of the proposed changes would impact new hires, there are serious concerns that a diminishment of benefits for any of our members could hurt everyone.

Ultimately, these attacks are misplaced. Although our state is facing a serious fiscal crisis, our members continued to uphold their end of the bargain by making their payments into the pension system. But the stat’s pension holiday and investment losses have set the stage for the current financial crisis, which leads to attacks on our members’ hard-earned benefits.

Call, Write, Fax, and Email Your Legislators Today.
Ask them to oppose tiering the retirement system.
Go to www.njleg.state.nj.us to look up your legislators.