Passage of Amendment 3 on the October 14th ballot would require lawmakers to use 25% of any state surplus to pay state retirement debt. President of the Public Affairs and Research Council Steven Procopio said this would increase the current minimum of 10% to 25%.
“And then the 25% would be as long as there’s retirement debt, as opposed to paying off this sort of initial chunk retirement debt which should end around 2029,” said Procopio.
Procopio said when there is a state surplus of dollars, it’s a matter of do voters want to a portion towards paying off retirement debt…
“Which then frees up money for school systems and healthcare, or do you want to not mandate that the legislature does that which means that money could be spent on things like infrastructure and roads,” said Procopio.
The four major retirement systems (Teachers, State Employees, School Employees, and State Police, have a combined $17 billion gap between how much they need to pay in benefits and their investment assets.
For a more comprehensive look at Amendments 1-4 on the October 14th ballot click here.
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