The Union-Tribune has a story today about a battle over the value of future pension payments between recently departed San Diego City Employees’ Retirement System (SDCERS) Administrator David Wescoe and Councilman Carl DeMaio.
The story’s headline says that DeMaio was “flagged” on pension payment data and that on his way out the door, Wescoe called DeMaio “misleading.”
Very well, my interest is piqued…what does the story say? Turns out that Wescoe is criticizing DeMaio for using numbers SDCERS provided to DeMaio!
From the article:
“The numbers are from an August report created by the pension fund’s outside actuary, Gene Kalwarski, to show what it will cost to pay off the billion-dollar-plus pension deficit over the next 25 years.”
And here is where it gets interesting:
Mayor Jerry Sanders also relied on those figures when he recently formulated a five-year budget outlook for the city.
It doesn’t seem like Wescoe criticized the Mayor and his financial folks for using the numbers he provided. Why did he single out DeMaio? The article continues:
“The criticism from Wescoe follows the harsh words he leveled at DeMaio and Councilwoman Donna Frye in September. The council members said the pension board shouldn’t even consider a proposal that would have decreased the city’s annual payment this year but lead to larger payments down the line. The pension board eventually sided with the council members.”
Yikes. Smells like sour grapes. Is it the proper role of the administrator of the retirement system to attempt to smear an elected official? Let alone for using numbers provided by the system’s independent actuary? Seems absurd.
Comments 7
It was a pretty poor choice of words for the departing bureaucrat that’s for sure. Pretty defensive for a guy who was part of the whole debacle.
I totally noticed both the Mayor and DeMaio used the same numbers but the bureaucrat chose to take a shot at DeMaio only. The good old buddy buddy system at work at City Hall.
I’ve concluded that Sanders and Faulconer are part of the problem — and that the only person fighting for taxpayers at City Hall is DeMaio.
Frye is better than Sanders and Faulconer when it comes to fiscal issues which isn’t saying a lot.
From the Twitter feed (this was tweeted by the UT itself)…
From: @sdutLocalPol
Sent: Dec 14, 2009 11:16a
@sandiegorostra rewrites our headline as, “Pension System Exec Ends Tenure With Deceptive Mudslinging” http://tr.im/HBPk
On Twitter: http://twitter.com/sdutLocalPol
Turgidson shoots, he scores !
On another point…. we now have 2 Republicans on the
SD City Council (Kevin Faulconer and Carl DeMaio).
BOTH are doing good work, yet an anonymous poster
today takes an irrelevant shot at Kevin Faulconer. It’s
logical to think this is a Democrat trying to stir a fight
here among Republicans.
I ask my fellow Faulconer Fans and DeMaio Devotees
not to fall for this lame gambit ! Each councilman has
proven his worth.
Kevin Faulconer spends way way too much time kissing up to Jerry Sanders and the establishment. It’s actually kinda funny and demeaning to watch him. He’s a follower, not a leader.
Two fake-name anonymous posts, same message.
Nice try, Democrat troll, but No Sale !
A REMINDER OF THE RULES TO OUR ANONYMOUS COMMENTERS: SELECT A PSEUDONYM AND STICK WITH IT. THOSE CONTINUOUSLY POSTING COMMENTS UTILIZING DIFFERENT MONIKERS SO AS TO APPEAR AS IF “THEY” ARE MORE THAN ONE PERSON WILL BE ASKED TO LEAVE, JUST NOT THAT NICELY. IF YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE DEBATE BY YOURSELF USING ONE NAME, PLEASE TRY ANOTHER BLOG.