Time to act on pensions

Bill Thielen, head of the Kentucky Retirement Systems from 2006 to 2016, recently wrote an opinion column listing reasons for the catastrophic funding deterioration of the Kentucky Employees Retirement System over the last 17 years.

He indicates the problem with funding has been the failure of past governors and legislators in 15 out of 22 years to pay actuarially required contributions. He listed other contributing factors, such as the recessions of 2001-2002 and 2008-2009, resulting in negative investment returns.

Thielen does not comment on the involvement of the KRS in KERS’ present status. There have been questions relating to its investment strategies, decisions, results, professional consultant fees, accountability and transparency over the years.

There is little doubt that past governors and legislators, given shortage of revenue and other priorities, decided to ignore the needs of the public pension systems. Every governor and legislator who served since 2000 is responsible. They kept kicking the can down the road.

The legislature did not focus on the issue until 2013, with the first meeting of the Public Pension Oversight Board. We will now see if members and retirees will be held responsible for the inaction of others.

This story was originally published November 20, 2017 at 4:25 PM with the headline "Time to act on pensions."