[quote=EconProf]What these comments ignor is that the will of San Diego voters has been thwarted.
-snip-
That’s why San Diego voters voted as they did.[/quote]
The reality, EconProf, is that SD voters were, in effect, lied to during the City’s (yes, it WAS the City’s) campaign for Prop B. They were also (purposely) NOT told that the campaign, as it stood, was against the law and not only did City already know that and had been litigating thusly for years and lost, they knew it would invite future litigation … and rightly so.
The campaign for Prop B was a desperate attempt by City to circumvent contracts they already agreed to and get some new hires off DB pension plans … even those hired in a particular “window.”
However, practically speaking, this issue is really moot as any City “new hires” have to make it at least five years on the job (to vest). Since between ~now, when they are hired and five years from now they won’t get any credit for retirement purposes (it will all be thrown on their books at the five-year point or longer, taking into account any LWOP the employee takes), City and unions have enough time to litigate the outcome of Prop B.
If Prop B is struck down as unlawful by a CA court, those employees in the “window” who make it to vesting will undoubtedly sue City (likely through their union[s]) for their DB pension plans if City doesn’t voluntarily restore them for this group.
SD Taxpayers should actually be outraged that City chose to dupe them into voting for the Prop so they could spend taxpayer money in this way. State law allows City to get fee waivers for court costs, but they will undoubtedly have travel costs to OAK, SFO and SAC. They will also have to contract appellate work out to outside attorneys (ESP at the Supreme Court level), IMO. This is due to a blatant conflict of interest the City Attorney’s Office has in this case, as they are actually an original charging party to one of the underlying ULP’s.
City well knew how this “comedy of errors” would play out long ago and consciously chose to spend future taxpayer dollars in this way instead of fixing potholes, trimming trees, and setting up “meet and confer” meetings with their unions, as they were required to by law.
This whole debacle is just another egregious example of your elected officials and tax dollars at work, folks. Public-official arrogance and politics rule the day in SD and always have.
