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politickernj.com - New Jersey State Policemen’s Benevolent Association President Patrick Colligan expressed disappointment in the Supreme Court’s ruling today and zeroed in on the crux of the court’s argument, calling the Legislature to immediately repeal Chapter 78.
“Our law enforcement officers are out there every day working for our communities and continuing to make the payments required to make sure members and their families have a stable pension fund for their retirement,” said Colligan. “Today’s Supreme Court ruling is disappointing because it fails to make Governor Christie keep his promise to hard working law enforcement officers."
“The fact is that our members agreed to pay an additional 1.5% directly from their paychecks to fund our pensions as a result of the Governor’s own highly touted pension law,” he added. “While the Governor promised to use these funds to help secure our pension fund, he is now hiding behind the courts in an effort to continue syphoning these funds for his own political gain. This is not leadership. This is paramount to stealing from hard working law enforcement officers.
“The New Jersey pension system is not one monolithic fund that is losing money daily. In fact, the State manages five pension plans for State and local employees. Of those five, PFRS is financed mainly by local governments, law enforcement officers and firefighters who have been making their required pension payments, even with the additional 1.5% required from Governor Christie’s own Chapter 78 legislation of 2011. The PFRS system is stable at almost 77% and the only thing holding it back from operating at an almost 90% funding level is the governor’s broken promise.”
If Chapter 78 purports to be the law, why keep it when the court’s decision this morning mowed it down?
That was the rationale behind Colligan’s case in the aftermath.
“Chapter 78 mandated both employer and employee sacrifices to provide funding to support the pension system,” he said, citing Christie’s and the Democratic Legislature’s 2011 Act creating the pension overhaul. ” If it is only the employees who are required to make those sacrifices now under the Court’s ruling, then I am hereby calling on the Legislature to immediately repeal Chapter 78 in its entirety. It is only fair that this broken bargain be taken off our backs if the Administration refuses to do what it promised so clearly in 2011.”
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