Text of comments made to the Orange County Board of Supervisors by FACT president Jack Dean
Below is the text of what I said yesterday morning when I spoke at the Orange County Board of Supervisors meeting in favor of putting John Moorlach’s pension measure on the ballot. You can watch that portion of the meeting online which includes all the speakers both pro and con as well as the Supervisors’ comments. Also included is the 5.4 earthquake that hit just prior to the board’s vote. [Viewing Tip: In the lower left-hand box under the video, scroll down to Agenda Item #33 and click on its link to jump directly to that part of the meeting.] Here’s the text of what I said:
COMMENTS BY JACK DEAN TO THE
ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS MEETING
2008-07-29
Good morning, Honorable Chairman and Board Members.
My name is Jack Dean. I’m president of FACT, which is an acronym for the Fullerton Association of Concerned Taxpayers. I’m here today to ask you to put this measure on the ballot.
Under the auspices of FACT, I publish a website called PensionTsunami.com which tracks — on a daily basis — the ever-growing number of financial crises popping up in states, counties and cities across the nation caused by overly-generous public employee pensions and benefits which were promised in the past by elected officials.
I could regale you with many tales of governments in trouble. For example, Atlanta, Georgia is in the news this week struggling to deal with its $1.2 billion unfunded pension liability. The city of Vallejo in northern California is currently in bankruptcy proceedings, and while most news reports focus on a $16 million budget deficit, it is instructive to note that Vallejo’s top two debts are its unfunded pension and health care benefits totaling nearly a quarter of a billion dollars.
But this is a digression from my purpose in being here today, and we have our own unfunded liability right here in Orange County.
I was motivated to launch the Pension Tsunami website four years ago in 2004 shortly after that Board of Supervisors voted to change Orange County’s pension formula, thereby giving employees an outrageous 62% increase in their pensions.
A year earlier — in 2003 — the Orange County Grand Jury had addressed the escalating costs of public employee pensions and
benefits in a report it issued titled, “Who Represents Orange County Taxpayers?” By their vote in 2004, it was apparent that the Supervisors then in office DID NOT.
While pension benefits legally granted by a previous board cannot be taken back, this board has an opportunity to let the taxpayers speak for themselves regarding any future benefit hikes.
Let the taxpayers see how much county employees are paid and how much their pension increases amount to.
And let the taxpayers decide whether the benefits are fair and whether they want to pay for them.
Ideally, the way to totally eliminate the potential for any future unfunded liability is to freeze the current defined-benefit plan and set up a second tier defined-contribution plan for all new hires. But since that option is not on the table today, FACT will settle for this charter amendment.
Please. Put this on the ballot. Let the taxpayers decide.
Thank you.