April 24, 2012 10:48 PM UTC

A new mission for Colorado Treasurer Walker Stapleton.

• 8 Comments
• by: PolDancer

A District Court Judge recently ruled against Colorado Treasurer Walker Stapleton’s efforts to seek information regarding Colorado PERA’s top benefit recipients.

See: http://www.copera.org/pera/​ab…

However, this adverse court ruling need not spell the end to Stapleton’s campaign to draw attention to lofty pension benefits.

He need merely shift his focus from public sector retirement benefits to the private sector, that is, top pension benefit recipients in the private sector.

Treasurer Stapleton may find inspiration for this new mission in the work of California Senator Mark Leno and Leno’s recently introduced legislation in California.

“Leno’s first-in-the-nation bill would require publicly traded corporations to report the amount of money their top five highest-paid executives receive in retirement.”

“It’s time to shed some light onto how company executives enrich themselves by millions of dollars each year while eliminating pensions for the lower earning workers they have sworn to protect,” said Leno, who represents Marin in the state Senate.

The article:

http://novato.patch.com/​artic…

I suggest that the Treasurer kick off his new mission by perusing the book Retirement Heist: How Companies Plunder and Profit from the Nest Eggs of American Workers, by Ellen Schultz, award-winning Wall Street Journal investigative reporter. A taste of the book:

“As far as I can determine there is only one solution [to the CEO’s demand to save more money], the HR representative wrote to her superiors. That would be the death of all existing retirees.”

(Note to Colorado PERA Board of Trustees, this quoted comment was made tongue-in-cheek and should not be considered a viable board policy option.)

Walker it’s time you took the good pension fight to the private sector! Get-R-Done!

P.S., Friend Save Pera Cola on Facebook, Visit saveperacola.com, Support the Colorado pension theft lawsuit!