Pensions

Pensions

August 6, 2010 Public Sector Roundtable

Pension costs are going up for cities everywhere at the same time as cities face shrinking budgets. The resulting crisis was the topic of the August 6, 2010 Public Sector Roundtable, a meeting of local public officials and Ethics Center staff.

Speakers

Judy Nadler, Markkula Center for Applied Ethics

Jay Goldstone, San Diego COO

Alex Gurza, San Jose Director of Employee Relations

Dan Rich, Campbell City Manager

What We Learned

A Framework for Thinking Ethically About Government Pensions
Ethics Hotspots

Participants

Nellie Ancel, Fremont Senior Deputy Attorney
Gary Baum, Palo Alto City Attorney
Joan Borger, Fremont Assistant City Attorney
Liz Brown, Santa Clara Director of Human Resources
Patrick Burt, Palo Alto Mayor
Brian Doyle, San Jose Senior Deputy City Attorney
Rick Doyle, San Jose City Attorney
Dan Furtado, Campbell Council Member
David Ginsborg, Santa Clara County Deputy to the Assessor
Beau Goldie, Santa Clara Valley Water District CEO
Antonio Guerra, San Jose Budget and Policy Analyst
John Guthrie, Santa Clara County Finance
Melinda Hamilton, Sunnyvale Mayor
Kirk Hanson, Markkula Center for Applied Ethics
Emily Harrison, Santa Clara Deputy County Executive
Barbara Jordan, San Jose Senior Deputy City Attorney
David Knapp, Cupertino City Manager
Gary Luebbers, Sunnyvale City Manager
Fr. Tony Mancuso, Markkula Center for Applied Ethics
Laura Miyakawa, Cupertino City Human Resources
Raania Mohsen, Santa Clara County Cities Association
Joe Pirzynski, Los Gatos Council Member
Rumi Portillo, Los Gatos Human Resources Director
Fr. Nicky Santos, Markkula Center for Applied Ethics
Megan Satterlee, Los Altos Council Member
Jennifer Sparacino, Santa Clara City Manager
Steve Tate, Morgan Hill Mayor
Jamie Matthews, Santa Clara Council Member
Oliverio Pierluigi, San Jose Council Member
Wynne Furth, Atherton Town City Attorney

Ethics Hotspots

- Reforming California PERS how can we influence the legislators?
- Medical marihuana
- Structural financial problems or extraordinary fiscal crisis.
How do we discern one from the other?
- Other solutions to structural deficit. E.g. Shared services?
- OPEB liabilities with key focus on funding options and future costs
- What are the "restrictors" for the public servant to the public servants?
And what needs to happen to unbind the public servant?
- Regionalization for provision and services e.g. San Carlos contracting
for fire, police maintenance
- Are small jurisdictions going to disappear?
- Do a similar program in one year to evaluate progress made

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