Rep. Ferraro Seeks to Reform CT Employee Pension System

From the Office of State Representative Charlie Ferraro: State Representative Charlie Ferraro testified before the legislature’s Appropriations Committee on three bills designed to restructure the state employee pension system.

“For years lawmakers have kicked our unfunded pension liabilities down the road while at the same time letting state employees pad their pensions with overtime and mileage reimbursement payments,” said Rep. Ferraro. “Including mileage reimbursement payments and overtime into pension calculations is unsustainable and digging our state deeper into a hole. We have the opportunity to save all residents in the state a considerable amount of money by passing much-needed pension reforms.”

Rep. Ferraro’s first addressed the need to pass House Bill 5691 which, if adopted, would eliminate mileage reimbursements from the calculation of state employee retirement income.

“One of the largest beneficiaries of the current calculation is us, as Legislators,” added Rep. Ferraro. “We are reimbursed for simply driving to work at the Capitol, a luxury virtually nobody else enjoys. We should lead by example with the alleged “shared sacrifice,” and eliminate this reimbursement as part of the retirement income calculation.”

Rep. Ferraro also spoke in support of House Bills 5692 and 5695. House Bill 5692 would eliminate overtime from the calculation of retirement income while HB 5695 would change the model we currently use, of basing retirement income on a percentage of an employee’s salary from the final three years of their service, to a percentage of the salary earned in the final ten years.

“It is common practice that individuals load up on overtime opportunities to pad their pensions over the last three years of their career,” explained Rep. Ferraro. “If we only calculated base salary into retirement benefits, we would be able to realize both short-term savings on overtime as well as long-term savings in pension funding. The time is now to affect real change and put Connecticut on the right path.”

The proposals now await action by the Appropriations Committee. The committee has until April 27th to move the bills to the House floor for debate.

Image via the Office of State Representative Charlie Ferraro