Prop. 33 would overturn ban

Staff Reports

With more than a million state and local public employees as members, The California Public Employees Retirement System is the largest pension plan in the country.

Proposition 33 overturns a constitutional ban, which forbids members of the state senate and assembly from contributing to the retirement system.

Assemblyman Brett Granlund, R-Yucaipa, is the chief proponent of Proposition 33. He says he is concerned that elected officials cannot have a pension plan like other state workers.

"We're one of the few California employees hired directly by the people through the polls," Granlund said. "There's 1.1 million public employees in the CalPERS system, and there are 98 members of the Legislature not allowed to participate."

Proposition 33 began as Assembly Constitutional Amendment 12, introduced by Granlund and Millbrae Democrat Louis Papan. After legislative passage, the bill, which allows legislators to start contributing to CalPERS and continue adding money if they had a previous vestment, must be put before the voters.

Members of the senate and assembly used to have their own pension plan, the Legislative Employees Retirement System, which was abolished in 1990 after voters passed Proposition 140, the term limits initiative. Legislators who were elected prior to 1990 were allowed to keep their vestments, but anyone elected after the passage of Proposition 140 could not contribute to the plan, Granlund said.

Opponents of the measure, however, see potential conflicts of interest if Proposition 33 is passed.

"One of the reasons that we decided in 1990 to limit legislators to Social Security because legislators create a perverse incentive for themselves," says Lewis Uhler, president of The National Tax-Limitation Committee, a taxpayer watchdog group based in Roseville.

Uhler, who was a co-sponsor of Proposition 140, also opposes Proposition 33 because of the benefits senators and assemblymen receive.

"Legislators, after 10 years, qualify for full, taxpayer-paid health benefits upon retirement," he said. "They're already paid $99,000 a year plus $25,000 of untaxed per diem. And it allows legislators to vest into PERS in 10 years while state employees in 20."

Political science professor Jay Stevens sees Proposition 33 as a way to allow men and women who serve in public office to not be shut out of a pension plan, especially if they had an existing vestment in CalPERS.

"If you're wealthy and run for office, you're cool," he said, "but if you're an ordinary citizen, you lose your pension benefit."