Tuesday, June 07, 2005

Get On The Natch - Part 2

In my continuing effort to explain how people feel about these legal deliberations, I've begun a series of blog entries called "Get On the Natch". Below is the second installment in the series, from an active participant over on the Oregon PERS Discussion Group (OPDG). These are NOT my words, but those of someone known only as "Retiree Robert".

"I just all of a sudden felt a rant coming on.

I hope to high heavens the Supremes deliver us some justice in its opinion on Lipscomb--some unambiguous, definite justice.

I slaved a whole career thinking my gnat-sized thimblecup-of-gold, my PERS pension, was waiting for me at the end of the line. I reached the line, applied for PERS, and was ready to live happily ever after.

Then AFTER I retired, they changed the rules. Then AFTER I retired and several years after the duly constituted PERS Board--with full legislative knowledge--distributed 20% to member accounts for 1999---only then did the powers that be say---uh,oh, the PERB made a boo-boo. They shouldn't have been so generous in 1999. Now I face the possibility of having to pay back part of the benefits granted to me---by a duly constituted PERB!!

Why in the hell should I, an innocent bystander who played by all of what I "thought" were the rules, have the rug pulled out from under me now---AFTER I have no choice to "undo" some of the decisions "I" made. Why in the hell should "they" "undo" their decisions years after the fact, and when I am stuck with my decisions, given no second chances to rearrange my affairs.

And these complaints hurt the active workers with 15, 20, 25 ,30 years in just as much as they hurt me.

If the Supremes don't do something in the Lipscomb case to provide some real justice, I am going to be thoroughly disillusioned."

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