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Cross won’t vote for pension reform bill

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Illinois

* House GOP Leader Tom Cross says he won’t vote for the pension reform bill which passed the Senate. The bill only covers state workers and members of the General Assembly…

House Republican Leader Tom Cross, of Oswego, doesn’t plan to vote for the Senate bill, arguing a pension fix should be all-encompassing plan that “includes everybody.”

“I think it’s a mistake,” said Cross, who wants to air it out with House GOP members. “I think it’s nibbling around the edges at best.”

* Voting against the GARS reform would be politically dangerous for some of his more vulnerable members. But at least one of his members agrees that the GA should wait…

State Rep. Pam Roth, R-Morris, said, while doing nothing is not an option, she also has little faith that any real progress on any of the pension problems is possible in a single day of negotiations on Aug. 17.

“I, like many of my colleagues, aren’t interested in dealing with one or two of our pension system problems at a time,” said Roth. “And, if some of these solutions don’t go into effect until 2014 anyway, I feel we should have more time to consider them.”

* Speaking of politics, the Daily Herald’s poll of convention delegates included a political question about pension reform…

In a Daily Herald survey of more than 75 Republican and Democratic delegates to the upcoming political conventions, 63 percent of GOP respondents said they thought cutting pension benefits for teachers, state workers and others would gain their candidates votes.

And about 15 percent of Republicans thought the issue was best left until after the election. Another 15 percent thought the issue won’t affect voters.

Democrats were more split over the question, with about 35 percent thinking cutting pension benefits would cost their candidates votes and 31 percent thinking it would help them.

The split could reflect the complexity of the issue and Democrats’ conflicts over how best to balance an effort to fix the state’s finances while recognizing their close ties to union workers.

* And as we’ve already discussed, the pension reform talk has prompted a rush to the exits by state workers…

During the 12-month period ending June 30, nearly 4,750 rank-and-file state employees retired. That’s almost as many as the prior two years combined. […]

About 4,647 university workers retired during the budget year that ended June 30 — the highest number in at least five years and nearly 1,300 more than the year before. […]

Retirement numbers through the Teachers Retirement System, which covers public school teachers in the suburbs and Downstate, have been on the rise over the last three budget years. But between April and July — part of the teacher retirement season — the number has hovered slightly above and below 3,000 the past three calendar years.

* Related…

* ADDED: All or nothing approach divides pension-reform camps

* Editorial: Too little trust in pension cost-shift plan: That requires faith the state would give more money to schools, something it has failed to do for many years. Illinois is last among the 50 states in state share of school funding. Quinn and Madigan are saying, trust us. Sorry, history says we can’t.

* Hopf: Approving pension reform not as easy as Quinn makes it seem

posted by Rich Miller
Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 10:19 am

Comments

The perfect is the enemy of the good. If you want to make progress, why not half a loaf now?

Comment by wordslinger Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 10:21 am
What Tom Cross really means is he doesn’t want any progress that might do any good.

The only “strategy” of Cross and the GOP in IL is to hope the state tanks and more people lose their jobs and homes. Then somehow voters are going to reward Republicans for doing nothing.

Pretty ridiculous. But yet Cross will be surprised when the gop loses seats in November.

Comment by just sayin' Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 10:23 am
The Republicans are super eager to have the pension “reform” that they aren’t going to vote for.

Comment by The Captain Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 10:25 am
What a shock that wordslinger supports Speaker Madigan. The answer as to “why not do half a loaf now” is provided by the Sun-Times, hardly a conservative shill: if they do that, they’ll almost surely use the court challenges regarding state constitutionality to avoid taking further action.

Comment by lake county democrat Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 10:30 am
Agree with you. They are mirroring the national Republican plan as well, it is a sorry day. I get a state pension and even though I don’t like the idea the system does need to be reformed. Just wish it is done sooner than later, so a sensible adjustment could be made. I think the no 3% or no health care is too drastic. Why not link the COLA to the same system used by Social Security and let retirees purchase health care.

Comment by illilnifan Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 10:35 am
Even if it is one third of a loaf (http://www.suntimes.com/opinions/14391606-474/editorial-go-all-the-way-in-fixing-state-pensions.html) as rather than half a loaf as wordslinger suggests, that’s a decent start.

Does anyone really believe that passing this bill would end talk of more comprehensive reform? If this bill passed, I’d still imagine that pension reform would be a top topic on capfax and in the SunTimes’ news and editorial page coverage.

Comment by Robert Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 10:45 am
As soon as they pass half a loaf OR a full loaf of pension “reform” given the plans floated so far, there’s going to be court challenges, which will eventually be successful since the “reform” details are violative of the state constitution and US Contract law anyway. Pass away. See you in court.

Comment by PublicServant Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 10:46 am
So, in numbers, assuming legislation passed for all four (why not judges? 5?) systems, and courts supported this legislation, how much impact will this make on the pension liability? From what I’ve read, not a solution without increased revenue.

Comment by geronimo Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 11:02 am
Would love to know what the House GOP roll call is like on the “Pension Reform Lite” bill that’s supposed to be voted on Friday. No doubt, a lot of opposition from the downstate GOP members (and plenty of support from the suburbanites.)

My point being that Cross likely doesn’t have 30 votes in his caucus to put on the bill — which has caused him to rethink his previously unbending support for pension reform. Rather than supporting it and watching it fail due to a lack of Republican votes, he may be setting up a pre-election ruse here by getting his entire caucus to be against the bill because “it doesn’t go far enough.” When in actuality, a good number of his members think it goes too far already.

The Chicago media is oblivious to the downstate GOP opposition to pension reform…and Cross wants to keep them in the dark. The Chicago media narrative is pension reform won’t happen because Democrats are held hostage by the public employee unions. That’s a good spin for Cross’ targeted races in the burbs. A roll call Friday with 20 or 25 downstate Republican “no” votes might change the media’s perception by exposing the fact opposition to pension reform is a bi-partisan phenomenon in Illinois.

Comment by Rick Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 11:22 am
What do the Republicans stand for? Why do our legislators collect a pay check to do nothing?

The S & P are going to turn our bonds into junk
because no one in Springfield has a back bone.
They would rather wait til 2014 to kick the can
again and again. Have they no shame?

Comment by mokenavince Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 11:23 am
wow. the earlier estimate was that 4,000 state employees would retire by june 30. we flew past that mark by 20%, to 4,750. i was talking to one guy this weekend who said 12 upper level professionals in his bureau resigned last fiscal year. at an average of 25 or 30 years of service, thats a ton of institutional knowledge and expertise.

thanks, daily herald, for asking folks about cutting benefits. this is a problem of unfunded liability, not overly generous benefits. no wonder the exit door is spinnning.

Comment by langhorne Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 11:41 am
@lake county:

It doesn’t matter what they pass right now. It’s going to be challenged in court whether it’s the full thing or something less. None of it will go into effect anytime soon. I will guarantee you that. Your argument doesn’t make any sense and neither does the Sun Times.

Comment by Demoralized Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 11:50 am
Hello. My name is Tom Cross. I’ll work to protect my rich suburban school districts from having to pay any pension costs, but I’ll work even harder to ensure that state employees pay more money for their retirements for less benefit.

Comment by Demoralized Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 12:14 pm
Anything passed for one or two systems (and successfully defended on constitutional grounds) COULD be used to graft into the other systems. For that reason, leaving the judges out of it is somewhat silly - the judges all certainly understand that anything upheld for one system is constitutional for the others). Leaving them out only makes them ‘technically’ not parties in interest in any litigation.

Comment by titan Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 12:21 pm
I believe the Tribune called the measure a “baby step up Kilimanjaro,” or something to that effect.

But unless I’m mistaken, the BIPARTISAN Senate bill achieves around $20 billion in savings out of the state’s $80 billion goal.

Hardly a “baby step.”

But, its a hilarious analogy for another reason. Anyone familiar with alpine climbing knows that the world’s highest peak, like Kilimanjaro, are not reached in a single day’s march. They require several legs of hiking to reach the ascent, often with layovers to acclimatize to the lack of oxygen.

While the shortest route up Kilimanjaro is shorter than a marathon, at only 23 miles, most people hike that in six days, not six hours.

Comment by Yellow Dog Democrat Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 12:39 pm
@mokenavince -

Tom Cross is not the least bit interested in our state’s bond rating.

He is only interested in his political survival, and he understands that if Governor Quinn and the Illinois General Assembly succeed in passing bipartisan pension reforms, his candidates will have NOTHING to campaign on in August, September, October and November.

His only hope is that the measure will either fail or pass only with Democratic votes.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see House Democrats take three votes on August 17th.

Comment by Yellow Dog Democrat Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 12:42 pm
Ydd,

The GOP does need to be involved in pension reform. But they can always campaign on the state of Illinois being in the worst fiscal shape of any state in the nation after 9 years of Chicago democratic control. Which includes a huge tax increase that Quinn lied about when he was running for election 2 years ago.

Comment by Fed up Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 2:00 pm
At some point in the not too distant future the legislature will appropriate about 90% of what is needed to pay current pensions, and the executive branch will cut checks for 90% of what pensioners are “entitled” to, and no one will be able to do anything about it. Problem solved.

Comment by wishbone Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 2:10 pm
@lake county democrat -

Two problems with your logic and the Sun-Times’.

First, if Radogno and the Sun-Times believe the bill changing pensions for state employees is unconstitutional, she should have voted against it and the Sun-Times should be opposing it.

Secondly, the idea that a “court challenge” or “constitutional questions” would halt legislative action is ludicrous. The General Assembly passed medical malpractice caps they knew were unconstitutional because they’d been rejected by the courts before. Didn’t stop them.

Remember Rod’s measure restricting the sale of violent video games? Lang foretold it would be struck down in court. Did lawmakers listen? Nope.

Little by little, the campaign finance law is being rendered meaningless; despite serious legal flaws that many warned of, editorial boards and reform groups rallied more than enough votes in the General Assembly.

Trust me: if lawmakers are actually Looking for an excuse not to act on teacher pensions after the election, they won’t need a pending court case to hang their hat on.

Comment by Yellow Dog Democrat Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 2:20 pm
@Fed up -

Voters are not policy wonks.

If Democrats vote to cut state pensions by $25 billion on Friday, I wish Tom Cross and the Illinois GOP the best of luck explaining to voters why they voted No in a way that doesn’t sound cravenly partisan and appeals to independent voters.

Comment by Yellow Dog Democrat Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 2:29 pm
If Cross opposes partial pension reform, does that mean he will vote NO on any bill that fails to address all 5 systems, including the judges??

Comment by reformer Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 2:29 pm
While I am sure pension reform fears impacted those in SURS to retire, a bigger impact was the new formula for determining benefits that went into effect last month. Basically, if you did not retire by the end of June, your monthly pension check would be about 7% lower than if you did retire by June 30.

Comment by G'Kar Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 2:31 pm
@titan -

Mostly true.

Legislation that reduces the pensions of active judges could be struck on separate constitutional grounds, and not necessarily the pension clause.

That said, one can assume that all judges hope to retire someday.

However, I don’t think its fair to presume judges are motivated by self-interest. The proposed pension changes raise serious legal questions, as well as basic questions of fairness in our society.

Comment by Yellow Dog Democrat Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 2:50 pm
@Yellow Dog D - I’d simply raised the point that leavignthe judges out now doesn’t really change much in the following litigation (other than a technicality as to personal interest in the immediate lawsuits over the other plans). If the changes to the nonjudicial plans are consititutional, they will eventually be imposed upon the judicial ones too.

Comment by titan Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 3:04 pm
@titan -

I’m sure any self-serving judge gets that, I’d just argue we shouldn’t presume that the members of the Illinois Supreme Court are self-serving.

On the flip-side, I think Republicans facing election in November face a tough decision on August 17th. The measure before them reduces pensions of the General Assembly.

If they follow Tom Cross’ lead and vote against reducing their own pension, there could be real heck to pay at the polls.

Comment by Yellow Dog Democrat Monday, Aug 13, 12 @ 3:27 pm