Regarding "Pension reform a future benefit" [Editorial, March 16], the Tier 6 changes should have eliminated credit for unused sick days and overtime, but did not. The liberal public pension formula is still more generous than private pensions and will be partly offset by higher contributions from higher-paid public employees. Most public employee pensions are reasonable, but the costs on Long Island for typical teacher pensions -- which average $75,000 for 2008 retirees in my district, and police pensions, which are typically more than $100,000 -- are unsupportable.
But the real killer for taxpayers is the fact that public pensions, unlike private, can't be changed for current employees. Reforms only affect new employees. Hence, the only way growing pension costs can be offset is to freeze salary increases for current employees.
To do this, the Triborough Amendment of the Taylor Law must be changed to give school boards an equal footing with unions -- that means stopping step salary increases after contracts expire -- so that both parties are under pressure to settle.
Also, binding arbitration for police must be eliminated. Most arbitrators know that they must side with the unions or never be selected again. But, unfortunately, both political parties and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo are fearful of making these reforms.
Frank J. Russo Jr., Port Washington
Editor's note: The writer serves on the executive committees of Long Islanders for Educational Reform, a taxpayer group, and the Nassau County Conservative Party.
The last bastion of financial security for the average middle class (now lower middle class) worker has been rocked to its foundation. This governor has done nothing to find alternatives to balancing the budget. He has just put the blame on hardworking people.
The real attraction of those jobs is the pension. The municipal and state workers' pension was always highly regarded and jealously coveted by others. Now the state has denied future workers the chance that their predecessors had.
If retirees in this state do not have an adequate way to support themselves, they will continue to leave and live elsewhere. Then there will only be the wealthy and lower incomes to contribute to future budgets.
Robert F. Vitale, East Moriches
As I watch Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) and Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos (R-Rockville Centre) pat themselves on the back for cutting the pensions of hardworking civil servants, I am outraged.
It seems that civil servants have been under constant attack from politicians in both parties, the media and the elites for the past year in New York. They seem to have forgotten that the people who run Wall Street actually caused this mess, due to their incessant greed and lack of effective regulation.
No one on Wall Street has been held accountable for the deliberate deceit they cooked up that affected this entire nation and the world's economy.
These pension changes have all but ensured that future workers and retirees will have a harder time making ends meet.
Even sadder is the number of non-civil service workers who buy into this orchestrated campaign to divide working people by espousing that no worker should have it better than any other worker.
From where I stand, the Democrats are doing to working people exactly what Republicans do to them, but at least Republicans seem to support law and order and some other commonsense initiatives that Democrats do not.
Anthony Johnson Sr., Brentwood
Editor's note: The writer is a retired public employee.
I am a former employee of the Nassau County comptroller's office, a retired accountant with 28.5 years of service. I am glad that former comptroller Howard Weitzman pointed out the need for a more secure pension plan ["Danger in pension changes," Letters, March 14]. The 401(k) is not a good way for young employees to save for retirement.
Weitzman wrote, "Retirements were supposed to rest on three legs: pensions, Social Security, and private savings." I believe that retirements should be provided for by larger payroll deductions through Social Security. This would ensure that all employees have a financially secure retirement, both in the public and private sectors.
Young workers do not think about saving for retirement; increasing Social Security deductions from their paychecks would be a forced savings for their futures.
I spent 22 years working for municipalities and small districts in Nassau County. There are changes that need to be made in the pension system.
County workers, upon retirement, are often paid for all unused time off, not a percent of it. After 20 to 30 years, this can add up to hundreds of days. This leads to front-line payouts of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Also, most employees can pad their base pay by working unreasonable amounts of overtime in their final three years.
Health care benefits, six-figure pensions and payouts of hundreds of thousands of dollars in unused time and years of service, can no longer be sustained.
High-ranking court employees and others retire, collect a pension (in addition to free health care), and then are permitted to be rehired under a different county title, earning a salary while collecting the pension! Why is this allowed?
The average civil service worker with an annual a pension of $19,000 to $25,000 is not killing the system. It is the above-mentioned abuses.
Gary Soccorso, Wantagh
