INDEPENDENCE CONTINUED FROM PAGE 27
strong as it could be for the remainder of the state. So it’s a big
day.”
If there was a Thomas Jefferson of this endeavor, it had to
be NJ State PBA Director of Government Affairs Rob Nixon. He
spent this past Fourth of July with his feet up, finally able to
rest after three years that culminated with giving life to some-
thing that will benefit every law enforcement officer past,
present and future.
“It truly is Independence Day,” Nixon proclaimed. “Inde-
pendence from an awful state pension management system
over the past two decades.”
As a reminder, Senate Bill 5 – the PFRS Governance and
Investment Act – enacts its own board made up of employ-
ees and employers independent of political interference. The
board will have police and fire representatives elected by the
members, as they are now, but also have professionals, in-
cluding an executive director, general counsel and chief in-
vestment officer, rather than members of state government
making all the decisions.
Modifications made after the governor’s conditional veto
allow the $20 billion in the PFRS pension fund to be main-
tained by the state but still grant control of the investments to
the PFRS. The PFRS Board of Trustees will also have auditing
power over the Division of Investments handling of invest-
ment decisions, accounts and funds, and the board will also
maintain control of future changes to PFRS benefits and COLA
through a process that requires actuarial certification.
To get the bill to the goal line, Nixon said the PBA was fortu-
nate to have the guidance of Senate President Steve Sweeney,
28
NEW JERSEY COPS
■ JULY 2018
The long journey to singing the bill to make PFRS independent led to all
smiles for NJ State PBA President Pat Colligan, Governor Phil Murphy and
FMBA President Ed Donnelly.
the SB 5 sponsor who offered his support three years ago. In
the end, they never lost sight of the most important goal.
“The most important thing we had to do was establish the
PFRS as autonomously as we could,” Nixon detailed. “That
way it would focus on nothing more than fully funding the
pension system.”
Colligan, Kovar, Nixon, Donnelly and the rest of the SB 5
founding fathers wanted to make sure the governor never lost
sight of that objective. Following the conditional veto, achiev-
ing that objective required some early-morning negotiating
sessions in the office next to the conference room where the
bill was signed. Spirited discussions, to say the least.
“We had some very contentious meetings with some col-
orful language,” Colligan revealed. “We were persistent. Even
when it got to the last-minute negotiations, we had decided
that if it wasn’t what we originally set out to do, we weren’t go-
ing to go forward with it.”
Given that the administration and state legislature are now
considering proposals for the other public employee pension
systems that even include turning them into 401K programs,
PFRS independence seems even more historic. It’s almost as
if the PBA was able to rely on the principle that whenever any
form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is
the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute
new government, laying its foundation on such principles and
organizing its powers in such form as to most likely to affect
their safety and happiness.
Consequently, the governor found a certain pursuit of hap-
piness, even though outside the PFRS the state is mired in
what he called a woe-is-me pension crisis.
“These folks have shown that if you stay the course and work
both within your organization and with government and with
pension and investment reality, you can get to a good place,”
Murphy proclaimed. “So I think this should be a celebration.”
Ironically, the new PFRS will go through its formation
during the next year. The new Board of Trustees will officially
begin work 366 days following the signing of Senate Bill 5. That
would be July 4, 2019. Independence Day, to be sure. d