Stockton, CA. is THE Case to Look at For Pension Prospects

CalPERS (California's Largest Pension Fund)

Almost exactly TWO years ago U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Christopher Klein ruled that Stockton, CA. could move forward with a plan to reorganize its debt. In that decision, he twice stated that the creditors had acted in bad faith and had refused to pay their share of the costs for negotiations. The ruling made Stockton eligible for bankruptcy protection and left the door open for CalPERS’ (California’s pension giant) obligations to be part of negotiations in the coming phases of the bankruptcy.

 (http://www.latimes.com/…/la-fi-pension-controversy-20150317…)

The Stockton decision has opened the door for the state to follow suit.

In the ongoing fight, the issue will be whether U.S. bankruptcy law trumps California law, which says the pension plan must be funded. IF it does, then the pension system there is all but dead in the water and that opens the door for more direct, or frontal assaults on public pensions across the country.

Considering the fact that the $900 million Stockton owes to the California Public Employees' Retirement System (CAlpers) to cover pensions is its biggest debt - as is the case with many cities in California – you can see where BOTH sides are fully dug in.

Prior to bankruptcy, Stockton predictably slashed its police and fire departments, halted bond payments, cut employee benefits and adopted an emergency spending plan that drastically reduced many city services, but the city continued to pay into the state pension.

AND it didn’t take long for the fight to expand, as just 400 miles south, in the city of San Bernardino, in that city’s bankruptcy case, the pension fund faces a new legal challenge from two companies owed $50 million. The companies say it's illegal for the city to continue paying CalPERS to fund workers' pensions while they get nothing.

"This is significant," said Adam Tatum, research director at California Common Sense, a nonprofit think tank. "It has put a chink in CalPERS' armor."

Karol Denniston, a public finance lawyer at Squire Patton Boggs, said Klein's ruling was "critical for every municipality in California."

"Next time we see a Chapter 9 bankruptcy filing," she said, "pensions will be up for negotiation just like every other creditor."

Indeed, San Bernardino could become the first city in California to consider cutting worker pensions in a bankruptcy.

The fight has Municipal Labor in California back on its heels. Dave Low, chairman of Californians for Retirement Security, a coalition of 24 public unions, said workers are willing to discuss changes to their benefits during contract negotiations. He noted that Stockton's workers had agreed to give up the free healthcare they had been promised in retirement — a benefit worth more than $500 million.

"Unions have no interest in seeing their cities go bankrupt," said Mr. Low.

The fight is very real and with private sector pensions already gutted, the public sector workers are left with few allies among fellow workers.

WHAT, if anything, does this mean for New York?

That’s hard to say, given that the New York State-run pension funds are some of the best funded pension funds in the nation. STILL, that does NOT make New York immune to such national trends.

It also doesn’t help that new Municipal workers in New York City have lost many of the pension benefits that older workers have. Over a relatively short time period, those workers will become the overwhelming bulk of city workers and eventually ALL such workers. Couple that with the fact that the majority of pensioners leave places like New York for warmer, cheaper environs and you get a perfect storm – politicians willing to  sacrifice a non-voting group and resentful newer workers willing to trade the oldster’s pensions for some short term benefits for themselves.

It’s NOT a pretty picture!


SEE: http://articles.latimes.com/…/la-me-ln-stockton-bankruptcy-…

AND: http://articles.latimes.com/…/la-me-ln-stockton-bankruptcy-

Dealing With A Very Thorny Issue

Ryland Whittington

CNN has posted another interesting and controversial documentary titled “Raising Ryland.” http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/18/living/feat-transgender-child-raising-ryland/

There are two ways to process such things; emotionally, which can be threatening to a LOT of people and lead to outright rejection and even anger, or more logically with an honest and open curiosity about HOW and WHY such anomalies occur.

CNN’s short film called Raising Ryland and a corresponding article titled “When Your Daughter Says, ‘I’m a boy’ ”, chronicles the story of Ryland Whittington and that child’s transitional journey. Ryland’s mother, Hillary Whittington says that Ryland would scream "I'm a boy" as soon as he started speaking, and showed an aversion to anything feminine.

Is it possible for a very young child to make such a life-altering determination?

I really DON’T know.

Is it true that, as some advocates have said, “Sex is genetic, while gender is emotional, or inside your head”?

Again, I honestly DON’T know.

Wow! Come to think of it, there’s a LOT that I’ve got to admit I really just don’t know about such issues.

In the CNN film, the Whittington’s decided to listen to their child and allowed young Ryland to “transition” to a male well before school began.

At first blush, my initial thoughts were, that “SRS (sex reassignment surgery) doesn’t change an individual’s genetics, just their exterior, so why put anyone through such a procedure when it doesn’t address the underlying genetics?” I also wondered if I COULD let a very young child make such a life-altering decision, given how often we all change throughout childhood.

Fact is, this can be a disturbing film because it’s such a disturbing subject, one that threatens or undermines what so many of us believe about gender, “social norms” and so much else that appears to give a sense of permanence to society.

One thing I strongly suspect, in fact, I believe, is that people DON’T choose to go through something like this any more than a person actually “chooses” to become homosexual.

When I’ve thought about this issue, I’ve come to consider that perhaps it’s the belief that such things are “deliberate choices” that brings with it so much revulsion and intolerance. I mean, if you believe another person CHOOSES to become homosexual, or simply CHOOSES to become transgendered, then you also probably believe those people are doing that to deliberately make you feel uncomfortable, to deliberately challenge the existing order, to willfully upend the apple cart, so to speak...BUT that view makes the issue “ALL about us” (the observers) and ignores the individuals actually going through such ordeals.

I tend to believe that homosexuality is innate, or inborn, just as is heterosexuality and I DON’T believe anyone would CHOOSE to become transgendered, they too appear to simply be “wired that way” and actually believe they were “born into the wrong bodies.”

The question is, regardless how uncomfortable such things may make us, HOW does another person going through such things actually harm any of us who are not?

Moreover, HOW does tolerating such people do any harm to any of us?

There is STILL a LOT that I don’t understand about this subject. I don’t understand the idea that “sex is genetic, but gender is in our minds,” and I don’t know if I could make the same decision the Whittington’s did, especially in light of reports like this one; http://www.theguardian.com/society/2004/jul/30/health.mentalhealth

I am NOT very (at all) religious, and so I understand that my own views probably differ with those of the very religious. I accept that, AND I accept other’s right to vehemently disagree with me.

What I find horrifically ironic is the fact that there are so many “tolerance-advocates” out there who’d seek to punish others simply for NOT believing as they do...for NOT following some pre-conceived “politically correct orthodoxy” on the issues. I have NOTHING in common with those people. In fact, THEY have a LOT in common with the people they’d like to silence!

ALL of that seems very much akin to asking a group of Nazis to determine our free speech policies. When the purveyors of “tolerance” become just as intolerant as those whom they call “intolerant,” then true tolerance is all but a lost cause.

When I saw this CNN film my primary concern was over that child’s future happiness. Did a veritable toddler make the right decision?

Where the parents right in following their child’s lead?

Again, all I can say is...I really DON’T know.

I suppose time will tell.

I know what I believe, but beliefs can be right or wrong, depending upon input. As I said, I believe such things (homosexuality, transgenderism, etc.) are innate, biological, or chemical/hormonal, thus NOT “deliberate choices” people make. I also believe that EVERY religion (at least the Abrahamic religions – Christianity, Islam and Judaism) puts far too much emphasis on sexuality.

Again, that is merely my OPINION, and perhaps, in religion’s defense, it’s served to strengthen the traditional family, fortify monogamy and inculcate respect for traditional Marriage. If so, it has done so for eons, but all of that has been eroded by our “post-modernist world,” which SEEMS to be here to stay...at least for the foreseeable future.

It also seems that by OVER-emphasizing and criminalizing so much of human sexuality these religions have undermined their initial, or original message. Hard to say, especially for someone as non-religious as myself.

Here’s what we are faced with today, the QUESTION; “Is it too much to ask for some tolerance and dignity for those going through such personal issues (gender dystopia and sexual orientation)? Even for those of us who don’t really understand any of it, can we at least accept their humanity and, in effect, decriminalize those things we may have been taught to see as “indiscretions”?

That too, is probably up to each individual to answer for themselves.

It’s a thorny issue that will take some time to fully work out.

You Can REALLY See You’re Life Changing When You’re Life’s Theme Track goes...

...FROM THIS

...to THIS

...to THIS

...and...

...ultimately to THIS

A Very Special WNYF Cover....

WNYF 4th Issue of 1986 - BACK COVER by John Goss



Thanks to Lt. Patrick McCarvil for finding this old WNYF (With New York Firefighters, the FDNY's flagship publication) from 1986.

John Goss was one of the many FDNY firefighters I was very happy to know. IHe passed away on my appointment date (March 15th, 1986) in 1997, the same year my Dad died. I still think of them both all the time.

I was blessed to have shared some of my time here with them.

THANKS to Pat McCarvil for finding and sharing this with me.