“Tapping into public resentment toward government pay perks, a state senator has introduced legislation that would put limits on the retirement benefits of government workers,” according to the Daily Democrat.
Who is that State Senator? His name is Joe Simitian (D-Palo Alto), but more importantly to those of us here in Orange County a more familiar name has co-authored the bill, S.B. 1425. No, I am not talking about Chuck DeVore, or Diane Harkey, or Jim Silva. Nope. The co-author of this bill, which will do a lot to control rising public employee pension costs is none other than State Senator Lou Correa (D-Anaheim)!
Under this “bill, bonuses awarded for seniority, extra pay for nighttime work and raises given to employees to put them on par with other employees, all which currently count toward the final salary, would no longer count.”
This is a great first start! Thank you State Senator Correa for doing the right thing in the face of so much pressure from union bosses!
That Correa is doing this in an election year underscores the extent to which he puts doing the right thing ahead of what is convenient.
Correa broke his tax pledge and raised them anyway.
I went to the State Senate’s web site to read the bill, and got a unable to identify message. Perhaps the bill has not yet been introduced? In any event – a thought – if this bill would constrain local government entities in collective bargaining, it would be yet another mandate and concentration of power from Sacramento and therefore distasteful. Another way to skin the cat would be for the legislation to just say that State funds allocated to a local government agency shall not be used to fund these kinds of retirement costs. That would make them a 100% local government cost. The result would send a clear message and make it much less likely that local governments would grant such retirement enhancements going forward, but it would not usurp local control.
Lou is the point man for the Dems and organized labor to do these kind of things. He did it while he was a supervisor as well when the adjustment to the County Employees pension fund took place. Lou takes on these issues under the full blessing of oranized labor.
Lou has always been a darling of the Repa in sacramento to the shagrin of Dems on issues like this because he can move amongst Reps with ease. Lou gains great support from Organized labor and the Rep Caucus for this.
Darling my ass. He lied and raised taxes after he broke his pledge.
Masters,
Reagan raised taxes in California too…
“Lou has always been a darling of the Republicans”
Hey Gustavo,
What’s the Mexican equivalent of the “House N (N word)”???