NOVEMBER LEGISLATIVE NEWSLETTER

Constituents:

     I glad that another election campaign cycle is over.  It was reassuring to win this election by a 57% to 43% margin.  I certainly want to thank my constituents for your support.

     There will be many crucial issues facing the Idaho Legislature in January.

     I will deal with these in a December Pre-Legislative Newsletter.  There is one new issue that recently came up. There was a rumor that Governor Otter wanted to make major changes with the PERSI retirement program. I contacted the Governor's Office and also talked with Don Drum, PERSI Director.

     Don told me that he had spoken with the Governor three times during the past few months and indicated that he had no plans to change the direction of the current PERSI Program.  However, we know there are several legislators who will be proposing such changes through the legislative process, and this must be stopped. It reminds of the old saying of a solution in search of a problem.   PERSI is ranked as one of the two top funds of it's type in the US.  Returns from July 1, 2010 is 12.22 % and the fund totals $11.3 billion.

     There is another factor to consider.  The States of Illinois and Indiana both facing big deficits borrowed billions from their state pensions fund, and they have not paid a cent back.  Illinois owed their state pension fund over $80 billion.  Borrowing from state pension funds puts the entire fund in dire straits and threatens future retire payments to retirees.  We must guard against this possibility.

Rep. Tom Trail

This site created and maintained by InfoTrail consulting.