Blog note: one of the committee
members is the foreperson of 2014-15 Grand Jury, which produced a 2014 report
on the county’s efforts to curb rising pension costs.
Sonoma County supervisors have named seven
people to a new citizens’ oversight committee to tackle an ambitious set of
goals related to employee pensions — some of which supervisors themselves have
been unable to accomplish.
Over the next nine months, the new fiscal
watchdog team is charged with reviewing the county’s accounting practices on
pension matters, helping to identify ways of lowering total pension costs — now
at $105 million per year — and drafting an easy-to-grasp message for the public
on pension reforms county supervisors have enacted since 2011.
Supervisor David Rabbitt, who also sits on
the Sonoma County Employees’ Retirement Association board, said part of the
problem is that the public largely does not understand how the county’s pension
system functions or the actions officials have taken to reduce costs, which are
up more than 500 percent since 2000.
“I believe that what we want out of the
committee is to verify what we’ve done to date,” Rabbitt said. “And to make
recommendations if there’s anything left uncovered . . .
to bring our pension costs in line.”
By 2024, Sonoma County wants to have reduced
its pension-related costs by half, to 10 percent of its $550 million payroll
for salaries and benefits.
The Board of Supervisors in April approved
spending $150,000 to form a pension oversight committee to increase
accountability and transparency on pension matters — a recommendation first
made by the board in 2011.
Rabbitt and Supervisor Susan Gorin, the board
chair, said they sifted through 28 applications and interviewed candidates
before naming seven Sonoma County residents with diverse backgrounds in finance
and accounting to the committee earlier this month.
The selections, including taxpayer advocates,
fiscal analysts and Santa Rosa’s chief financial officer, have drawn some
concern from pension critics, who say supervisors did not choose people who
have enough familiarity with the county’s pension woes.
“I’m disappointed; there were very good
people who submitted applications but were not selected or even interviewed,”
said Ken Churchill, an outspoken commentator on the county’s pension spending
who said he wished he’d been chosen. “For three years, I’ve been critical of
the pension system and trying to shine light on it.”
The group’s members include Jack Atkin, former
president of the Sonoma County Taxpayers’ Association, who has advocated
strongly for reducing total spending on retirement benefits; Martin Jones, last year’s civil grand jury foreman, who
helped produce a 2014 report on the county’s efforts to curb rising pension
costs; and Deborah Lauchner, who helped bring Vallejo out of bankruptcy
and was hired in 2014 as Santa Rosa’s top finance official.
“There is some concern, politically, that
because I’m the CFO of Santa Rosa, people would view my participation as an
inside job,” Lauchner said. “But my motivation is really driven as a Cotati
resident. I was able to make some huge changes in Vallejo, bringing that city
out of bankruptcy, saving a little over $100 million in their long-term
liabilities and balancing the first balanced budget Vallejo had seen in over a
decade.
“I’d love to be able to use my experience and
make some positive changes in the community I grew up in.”
The other members of the committee include
Bob Likins, a retired actuary; Richard Tracy, who previously served on the
Governmental Accounting Standards Board, an independent agency that sets
accounting standards for public sector financial reporting; Lawrence Heiges,
with 26 years of experience in commercial and investment banking; and Rebecca
Jones, who said she has 40 years of experience in accounting and financial
analysis.
Rabbitt and Gorin said the selection process
was “challenging.”
“I think we’ve found them to be fair and
open-minded, with no preset agenda,” Rabbitt said. “They really want to learn
and understand what the system is all about.”
The committee will meet twice a month and its
meetings will be open to the public. The first meeting is scheduled for Friday,
and details will be posted on the county’s web site, www.sonomacounty.ca.gov.
Supervisors said they expect a final report
from the committee by June.
September 27, 2015
Santa
Rosa Press Democrat
By
Angela Hart
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