Contact Senate to Restore $500M in STRS Funds
CTA is working hard to secure the passage of a measure that will require the state to pay back to the State Teachers' Retirement System (CalSTRS) $500 million withheld from the system in 2003 to help balance the 2003-2004 California budget.
CTA-sponsored AB 265 by Assembly Member Gene Mullin (D-So. San Francisco) and Assembly Member Gloria Negrete McLeod (D-Chino) will come up soon in the Senate Appropriations Committee. Contacts are being urged to get in touch with all Senators because the measure will head to the Senate floor if the panel approves it. The funds will help refurbish the Supplemental Benefits Maintenance Account that provides inflation adjustments right now to some 60,000 elderly CalSTRS members who retired from 1960-1986. The bill will in future years provide the same inflation protection to other current and future retirees. The bill is a fiscal measure that requires a two-thirds vote.
If you need any more information, please contact Legislative Advocate Bill Collins or GR Communications Consultant Len Feldman at 916.325.1500.
Thank you again for your hard work on behalf of your colleagues on this key issue.
Urge Senators to Approve $500M STRS Restoration
The Senate Appropriations Committee will soon consider a CTA-backed bill that would pay back the State Teachers' Retirement System (CalSTRS) the $500 million withheld last year to help fill a $38.2 billion hole in the 2003-2004 budget.
AB 265 by Assembly Member Gene Mullin (D-So. San Francisco) and Assembly Member Gloria Negret McLeod (D-Chino) is expected to come before the Appropriations Committee by mid-August.
The bill would specifically require the state to reimburse CalSTRS for the $500 million that is part of a special fund, the Supplemental Benefits Maintenance Account (SBMA).
The SBMA account provides an inflation adjustment for about 62,000 long-term retirees who left teaching prior to 1986. Inflation has reduced the pensions of these retirees - whose average age is 82 -- by more than 20%. SBMA maintains the purchasing power of their payments at 80% of the original. Over time, other current and future retirees will see their own pensions shored up to the 80% floor.
The measure is fiscal bill that requires a two-thirds' majority for passage.
Support for the measure is widespread in the education community.
The entire Retirement Coalition - which includes teachers, school employees, school administrators, CalSTRS and other school supporters - is working hard for the measure's passage.
CTA Members:
Write or call your Senator - even if she or he is not on the Senate Appropriations Committee.
(The Appropriations Committee is included below.)
Contacts, particularly those of you who are Contacts to Senators who are on the Senate Appropriations Committee, should make these major arguments in support of the measure.
- The bill allows the state to repay the money over time so its fiscal impact on the state treasury in any given year is minimized.
- The money goes to support a fund helping protect a stable retirement for a group of teachers who retired during the 1960-1986 period. Without these protections, inflation would have ravaged their monthly payments.
- The teachers affected by these adjustments are generally in their 80s and generally women. They have earned a stable retirement after long years of service to the children of California.
The measure will have to gain a two-thirds' majority in the entire Senate too, and that vote could come up very quickly after the bill clears the fiscal panel.
For more information, contact CTA Legislative Advocate Bill Collins or Communications Consultant Len Feldman at 916.325.1500.
Contact information for Senate Appropriations Committee