Ruling on Chuck Reed’s pension initiative not end of the world

by Chris Reed | March 14, 2014 6:30 am

Editor’s update, 2 p.m.: San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed is reportedly suspending the initiative push until 2016 because the court delays related to the ballot language challenge will make it difficult for signature gatherers to meet deadlines — not because of the ballot language the court said he must use.

A state judge’s ruling upholding the unappealing ballot initiative title and summary given to a badly needed pension reform measure triggered a lot of gloom Thursday from those who want to slow California’s slide toward ruin. But it’s not necessarily the end of the world.

Here’s a bit of the Sac Bee’s account[1]:

“A Superior Court judge dealt San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed’s pension overhaul campaign another setback on Thursday, rebuffing Reed’s request to have the ballot initiative’s title and summary rewritten.

“Reed and other public officials sued Attorney General Kamala Harris last month, arguing that her description of Reed’s pension initiative, which would empower local governments to change future pension benefits for current workers, was fatally biased.

“The sentence in dispute states that the measure ‘Eliminates constitutional protections for vested pension and retiree healthcare benefits for current public employees, including teachers, nurses, and peace officers, for future work performed.’ Reed and his allies said in their lawsuit that description was ‘false and misleading’ in a way that ‘creates prejudice’ against the measure.

“Not so, said Sacramento Superior Court Judge Allen Sumner. Going through the contested sentence word by word, Sumner found ‘nothing false or misleading’ about how Harris described Reed’s measure.”

It’s not 2004 — pension crisis has sunk in

I dispute the conventional wisdom that invoking “teachers, nurses and peace officers” is super-compelling to stopping voters from voting for pension reform.

Despite opposition from “teachers, nurses and peace officers,” sweeping pension reform measures passed easily in San Jose and San Diego[2] in 2012.

It’s not 2004 still. People understand the crisis is real and is affecting other government priorities in a negative way. Take it away, Washington Post[3]:

“SAN JOSE — Here in the wealthy heart of Silicon Valley, the roads are pocked with potholes, the libraries are closed three days a week and a slew of city recreation centers have been handed over to nonprofit groups. Taxes have gone up even as city services are in decline, and Mayor Chuck Reed is worried.

“The source of Reed’s troubles: gold-plated pensions that guarantee retired city workers as much as 90 percent of their former salaries. Retirement costs are eating up nearly a quarter of the city’s budget, forcing Reed (D) to skimp on everything else.

“’This is one of the dichotomies of California: I am cutting services to my low- and moderate-income people . . . to pay really generous benefits for public employees who make a good living and have an even better retirement,’ he said in an interview in his office overlooking downtown.

“In San Jose and across the nation, state and local officials are increasingly confronting a vision of startling injustice: Poor and middle-class taxpayers — who often have no retirement savings — are paying higher taxes so public employees can retire in relative comfort.”

‘Maviglium’ will bomb at box office

Once again, this is the liberal Washington Post’s framing of the issue, not Fox’s Sean Hannity.

I hope the hard work by Reed (no relation) pays off with the initiative making the ballot. If it does, it will pass, barring a 10-1 edge for the status quo-ers in campaign spending.

“Elysium” was a bomb at the box office. “Maviglium” will be,too.

Source URL: https://calwatchdog.com/2014/03/14/ruling-on-chuck-reeds-pension-initiative-not-end-of-the-world/

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