RESPONSE to S.644

Joseph A. Beaudoin, president of the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association (NARFE), released the following statement:

“This bill is another unfair and unwise attack on federal employees at a time when the country desperately needs a high quality and vigilant work force. Some politicians claim that these pensions are unsustainable, but, in actuality, the federal pension program is fully funded, actuarially sound and paid for largely by federal employees themselves.

“Changes to policies that affect federal employees threaten the future of the vital services they perform. Without employment packages that are competitive in the professional marketplace, our government will struggle to attract the best workers to protect us.

“Considering the importance of the federal meat inspectors in Kansas who ensure our food is safe or the U.S. nuclear regulators who now are working in Japan to avert a nuclear catastrophe, we can ill-afford to shy away from support for our nation’s federal workers.”

Postal Workers:

Clerks and other workers represented by the American Postal Workers Union will be getting a 3.5 percent raise, spread over the life of their new, no-layoffs contract with the US Postal Service. Roughly 200,000 workers will get a 1 percent increase in November 2012, a 1.5 percent raise in November 2013, and another 1 percent in November 2014. Workers will continue to get separate cost of living raises starting in March 2013.

Postal Service: The Federal Times on March 9 reported that the USPS will eliminate 7,500 supervisors, managers and postmasters, and plans to eliminate 30,000 positions this year.

Elimination of Federal pensions by 2013

Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., on Thursday introduced a bill (S. 644) that would eliminate the pension portion of the Federal Employees Retirement System for all new government hires beginning in 2013. The legislation would not affect Thrift Savings Plan benefits and agency-matching contributions. Nor would it affect FERS pensions for current federal employees and retirees. It would, however, apply to members of Congress.

"Right now, federal government workers receive far more generous retirement benefits than private sector employees," Burr said. "The cost to taxpayers of these benefits is unsustainable, and we simply cannot afford it. We cannot ask taxpayers to continue to foot the bill for public employee benefits that are far more generous than their own."

Federal employees are eligible for pensions, retirement savings plans with up to 5 percent in matching contribution and retiree health care benefits above and beyond those available to private sector workers, according to Burr. He also asserted that FERS is underfunded by almost $1 billion and the Civil Service Retirement System by $673 billion.

According to Tom Trabucco, director of external affairs for the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board, the agency match for FERS participants is dollar for dollar on the first 3 percent of pay contributed to the TSP, and 50 cents on the fourth and fifth percentage points contributed. Agencies also automatically put in 1 percent of basic pay for all new FERS enrollees regardless of the employee contribution. He noted, however, that the arrangement is not equal to a 5 percent total match.

The assertion that federal pension programs are underfunded is rejected by John Gage, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees, who called the bill "cruel and useless."

"Sen. Burr is wrong on the facts and wrong on morals," Gage said. "Eliminating pensions for future employees would do absolutely nothing for the fictional unfunded liabilities that the fact-challenged senator imagines he is resolving. Worse, Sen. Burr's bill is a mean-spirited attempt to deprive future employees of any hope of a dignified retirement after they have spent a lifetime in public service."

By Emily Long elong@govexec.com March 18, 2011

NARFE Scholarship Program

NARFE OPENS 2011 SCHOLARSHIP COMPETITION

The NARFE Scholarship Program is administered by the Federal Employee Education and Assistance Fund (FEEA) and is made possible by your tax-deductible contributions to the NARFE/FEEA Scholarship Fund.

The competition is open to all children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and stepchildren of all current NARFE members. A total of 60 scholarships of $1,000 each will be awarded, six in each of NARFE’s 10 Regions.

With the publication of the application form in the February issue of the NARFE magazine, the 2011 NARFE Scholarship Competition opened. The scholarship form appears on pp. 47 and 48 in the February issue and on pp. 45 and 46 in the March issue. It also will run in the April issue. In addition, the form is also available on the NARFE Web site, www.narfe.org.

The completed application is to be mailed to:

NARFE Scholarship Award,

3333 S. Wadsworth Blvd., Suite 300,

Lakewood, CO 80227

and

must be postmarked no later than April 30, 2011.

If you have any questions contact the Region III FEEA Coordinator , Sandy McKinney, 770-396-3598, skm1126@bellsouth.net.

The FEEA was orginally set up only as a college scholarship fund and then expanded to also include a $500 emergency fund for federal employees and retirees devistrated by hurricanes, earthquakes, tornados and floods.

CALL TO ACTION

To Congressman John L. Mica:

I am concerns about how my earned federal civilian retirement and health benefits could be affected by the budget-cutting attempts.

1. 1.) Federal civilian retirement does not face the same solvency challenges as trust funds that support Social Security and Medicare. Indeed, the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Fund (CSRDF) is fully funded and actuarially sound. In summary, by definition, under the financing arrangements set out in current law, the system is not now and never will be ‘insolvent’ or without adequate budget authority for payment of benefits.

2. 2.) Federal retirement will not be directly affected by the boom in the senior population because the federal retirement population is a function of the size of the federal work force, not the general population.

3. 3.) Disturbing is the plan to require our public servants to pay an increasingly higher share of Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHBP) premiums.

4. 4.) Disturbing also is the suggestion to use the Chained -Consumer Price- Index (C-CPI-U) to set cost-of-living adjustments. The proposals would serve to further erode the benefits public servants have earned doing the nation’s work.

Can I count on you to preserve COLA equity between all federal retirement programs and defend the integrity of a system that provides deferred compensation and benefits to individuals who have dedicated their careers to public service? Please, reply to this letter.

You’re Constituent,