• Take police and fire out of state pension system.
• Turn over the pension fund assets to the unions.
• Weaken your rights to a pension.
• Let the government off the hook for the pension payments it owes.
• Place your assets at risk.
Nixon then emphasized that the bill does:
• Preserve the Police and Fire Retirement System as a governmental
plan.
• Transfer control of pension management to an independent police
and fire board of trustees that includes representatives from all the
New Jersey public safety unions, a retired member and appointees
from the state – legislators who have a financial background and
are recommended by the League of Municipalities.
• Put day-to-day management of the system in the hands of profes-
sionals, whose job, as Nixon said, “is to come to work every day
and think about how to make PFRS make money.”
• Take politics out of management of system. Nixon: “Everything in
state government in New Jersey flows downhill from the governor.
One person dictating the policy is against your best interest.”
• Give the board the authority to adjust benefit levels, including re-
storing COLA.
• And this recently in: Whereas, the current system requires munici-
palities to make their annual pension payments on April 1, the new
plan will require making quarterly payments. “And there would be
the ability to withhold any state aid to local governments that re-
fuse to pay the required contribution,” Nixon added.
When SB3040 cleared the Senate unanimously, Senator Tom Kean,
one of the bill’s primary sponsors, shared some of his own post-game
analysis:
“New Jersey’s police and fire unions have a proven history of mak-
ing fiscally responsible choices regarding their pensions, which is why
PFRS is arguably the strongest of the state’s public employee pension
funds,” Kean commented. “It’s not surprising that the (unions) want
the power to go their own way with their pension fund. Quite simply,
our police and firefighters have earned it.” d
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