Yesterday, the state house
took up Senate Bill 123. This so called “fix-it” bill is a
mere 55 pages and 121 sections and will supposedly allow for
Alaska’s Defined Contribution Retirement plan (DCR Plan) to
pass IRS and other federal hurdles.
Rep. Doll (Juneau) offered an
amendment to allow public employees an option to decide what
works for them; a defined Benefits system (as was in
existence until July 2006) or a Defined Contribution (401-K
style) plan.
Alaska’s employers have had a
difficult time with recruitment and retention due to their
inability to offer a pension.
The debate
on the amendment lasted for about an hour before it was
defeated on a 15-21 vote (with four representatives
excused). Please send an e-mail of Thanks to Rep. Doll and
to the other 14 representatives that voted to support
NEA-Alaska’s 13,000 members and all of Alaska’s public
employees (bolded below). Ask the 21 representatives that
voted NO, why they will not allow Alaska’s public employees
a choice. Remember, Alaska is the only non social security
state that FORCES its employees into a risky 401-K plan
The question being: "Shall Amendment No. 1 be adopted?"
The roll was taken with the following result:
HCS CSSB 123(FIN)
Second Reading
Amendment No. 1
YEAS: 15 NAYS: 21 EXCUSED: 4 ABSENT: 0
YEAS: Buch, Cissna, Crawford, Doll, Doogan, Edgmon,
Gara, Gardner, Gruenberg, Guttenberg, Holmes, Kawasaki,
LeDoux, Lynn, Salmon
NAYS:
Chenault, Coghill, Dahlstrom, Fairclough, Foster, Gatto,
Harris, Hawker, Johansen, Johnson, Kelly, Meyer, Neuman,
Olson, Ramras, Roses, Samuels, Seaton, Stoltze, Thomas,
Wilson
Excused:
Joule, Kerttula, Kohring, Nelson
And so,
Amendment No. 1 was not adopted.
Like SB 141 (the 125 page behemoth with at least 90 errors)
two years ago there seems to be very few that even know what
is in the legislation.
The question that needs to be addressed is why is Alaska
continuing with a DCR plan at all? We know that Nebraska
and West Virginia went back to Defined Benefit (DB) after
suffering recruitment and retention problems, and in West
Virginia, they ended up with the must underfunded retirement
plan in the nation. This new DC plan is actually more
expensive for teachers than the TRS tier II plan.
Continuing on this path as the only State with no social
security net for public employees and no Defined Benefit
plan for public employees hired after July 1, 2006 is
ludicrous.
Please take the time to contact your Representative and ask
them, at a minimum to consider giving new employees a choice
of whether they want to go into a DB plan or a DC plan.
