How should Phoenix pay off $4B in pension debt? Voters may get a say

[TexasTowelie]

Phoenix voters may soon change how the city manages its growing multibillion-dollar pension debt.

A political committee called Responsible Budgets — backed by Councilman Sal DiCiccio — wants voters to change how Phoenix calculates its pension debt and require the city to spend almost all excess general fund revenue to pay down the debt.

The group submitted almost 50,000 signatures to the Phoenix City Clerk's Office on Tuesday. It needs 20,510 valid signatures to qualify for the August ballot. The clerk has until March 6 to verify the signatures.

Phoenix has racked up more than $4 billion in pension debt — money it will someday owe to its retirees.

Read more: https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/phoenix/2019/01/16/pension-initiative-backed-sal-diciccio-may-appear-august-ballot-phoenix/2583143002/

[wasupaloopa]

1. I did a lot of study on unfunded pension liabilities in Santa Barbara County. The recession plus poor

planning before recession and the fact that retirees are living longer are causes of our cities unfunded pension liabilities.

During the recession there was very little return on pension funds invested. By law they cannot invest in high risk investments.

Last year the County of Santa Barbara pension fund earned 10.5 %

A law in 2013 made the cities, the county and special districts put there unfunded liability on their balance sheet. Before it was not too visible.

They also had to have a plan to pay off the unfunded liability. They will take 23 years to pay it off and in a few years the employee contribution rate will increase.

They also put in a two teared pension formula. Under that idea those hired after 2005 will receive lower monthly pension payments than those who were hired before that.

The county of Santa Barbara has it's own pension plan which is well managed. The county will pay off their liability in 13 years. At that point because of the changes the contributions of the county and employees are planned to cover all current and future payments.

I was lucky to work for the County of Santa Barbara. The South county along the coast is very Democratic and no one there is calling for cutting off payments to retirees. The agricultural North county is more conservative as incomes go up.

The city where I live, Santa Maria is in the north county and is 73% Hispanic. Those eligible voters are mostly Democrats as is much of the state for the same reason.