Breaking The Camel's Back: Meeting Set for. R.I. Government Union Employees and Retirees over Lawsuit

02/22/2014

Informational meetings set for active, retired public employees on proposed pension accord

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Beginning next week and continuing through mid-March, active and retired public employees will get a dozen chances to attend informational meetings around the state on the proposed pension lawsuit settlement before they vote on the proposal.

Lawyers for the state and the five plaintiff groups representing unionized workers and retirees, posted a schedule of informational meetings on a new website — ripensioninfo.org — meant to serve as a clearinghouse for information on the deal.

The first meeting is scheduled for Feb. 26 at 5 p.m. at the Cranston Portuguese Club, 20 Second Ave., Cranston.

Lawyers for the two sides worked out the settlement after more than a year of closed-door negotiations. For it to be finalized, it will have to win approval on several fronts: first in two rounds of voting by current and retired public sector workers, then by the Superior Court judge overseeing the case, and finally the General Assembly.

If the settlement fails to win adequate support or is at all altered, the court case will resume in September with its focus shifted to the underlying question that the settlement avoided: Were the pension benefit changes approved by the General Assembly in 2011 constitutional?

The proposed settlement scales back some provisions — lowering some retirement ages, reducing the length of time between cost-of-living increases while the system is less than 80-percent funded and eliminating a requirement that longtime employees participate in a new 401(k)-style plan.

Voting on the settlement must happen within 60 days of Feb. 14, the day the settlement was announced.

The first round of voting will involve only members of the unions and retirees who were parties to the suit. It must pass by a simple majority.

The voting process follows the usual steps used in establishing a class action, explained Lynette Labinger, a lawyer who represented members of Council 94, the state’s largest employees’ union, in the negotiations. Ballots that are not returned are considered an acceptance of the settlement’s conditions and consent that the agreement can be handled as a class-action case.

The second round of voting — premised on the first round approving the settlement — will involve all other public sector employees and teachers with 10 or more years of service as of June 2012.

If the settlement passes both rounds of voting, Superior Court Judge Sarah Taft Carter will hold a hearing to determine whether the process of forming a class action was done properly. She will also rule on whether the settlement seems fair and reasonable and should be implemented.

Then the question of approval moves to the General Assembly.

State officials say the settlement deal preserves 95 percent of the savings in the 2011 overhaul and settles other lawsuits challenging pension changes dating to 2009. The deal, however, raises the state’s unfunded pension liability from $4.8 billion to nearly $5.1 billion.

source