NO, the state should not dump teacher retirement benefits on the local school districts. That idea is insane and would cost local towns $Millions regardless of what Christie or his cronies want us to believe.
JOHN REITMEYER | MARCH 2, 2015
That’s one of the suggestions of Christie’s expert commission, but the big question is what happens to property taxes
In New Jersey, school districts pay the salaries of their teachers, but it’s the state that picks up the costs of their retirements. Cities and towns, meanwhile, cover their employees’ salaries as well as their retirement costs.
That split responsibility is at the heart of one of the core elements of the sweeping changes to public employee benefits that were put forward last week by the nonpartisan commission of experts impaneled by Gov. Chris Christie. Boxed in by a state economy that hasn’t grown as quickly as he once envisioned and a recent court ruling ordering billions in additional state pension contributions, Christie charged the group with finding ways to make worker benefits more affordable.
The commission has proposed shifting the cost of teacher pensions from the state to the school districts, whose primary source of funding is local property taxes. It is also proposing the adoption of less-generous health coverage for teachers and other public workers, and it made the case that there would be enough savings from changing the health plans to allow the local governments to cover the cost of the pensions, which right now cost the state about $2.5 billion annually just for teachers.
“This reform would be cost neutral to local governments,” the report says.
But not everyone sounds convinced just yet. Bill Dressel, executive director of the New Jersey League of Municipalities, questioned the logic of diverting any savings realized by local governments when told of the commission’s ideas. He also noted that the pension funds for local employees like police officers and firefighters are among those in the overall pension system that are in the best shape....
Continue reading
No comments:
Post a Comment