News

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Optimistic CalSTRS Board Lowers Its Assumed Rate of Return But Not All the Way Down to Our 7.5%

Byuclafaculty

Since CalSTRS’ new assumption is still above ours, we can claim to be more conservative in our pension funding planning. See below: CalSTRS lowers forecast on future investment returns (excerpt) Dec. 3, 2010, Dale Kasler, Sacramento Bee After agonizing for months, CalSTRS made a decision Thursday that seems subtle but has enormous financial implications. The teachers’ pension fund agreed to lower its long-term forecast of future annual investment returns by a quarter of a percentage point… On an 8-3 vote, the board of the California State Teachers’ Retirement System agreed to cut the investment return forecast to 7.75 percent a…

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CalPERS & CalSTRS Profited from Fed’s TALF Program; UCRS Did Not Participate

Byuclafaculty

State pension funds reaped rewards from Fed loan program (excerpt) Dec. 3, 2010, Dale Kasler, Sacramento Bee CalPERS was among the big winners in an obscure Federal Reserve loan program aimed at rescuing the nation’s troubled credit markets last year. The state’s other big pension fund, CalSTRS, also participated in the program, but to a much smaller degree, according to records released this week by the Federal Reserve. …(T)hey and other big investors took advantage of a $70 billion Federal Reserve loan program designed to pump money into the consumer and business lending markets. CalPERS, in fact, was among the…

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Bad Deal for State Involves a UC Regent

Byuclafaculty

The California’s Capitol blog reported yesterday on the involvement of a UC regent in a bad deal for the state. By way of background, the state has a major budget problem. No secret about that. It also has a major cash problem linked to its budgetary distress. One way that the state deals with these allied problems is to borrow. It can engage in short-term borrowing through revenue anticipation notes (borrowing within a fiscal year) and revenue anticipation warrants (which allow cross-year borrowing). However, under normal circumstances, longer-term borrowing is constrained by the state constitution. In essence, such borrowing requires…

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GOP Plan Targets Sabbaticals for Iowa Professors

Byuclafaculty

Inside Higher Ed spotlights the article below today: GOP plan targets sabbaticals for Iowa professors (excerpt) Ryan J. Foley, Associated Press, December 1, 2010 IOWA CITY, Iowa. Newly empowered Republican lawmakers in Iowa want to cancel paid research leaves for university professors in a budget-cutting move, even as the Board of Regents considers approving them for dozens of employees for next year. Incoming House Speaker Kraig Paulsen said taxpayers cannot afford faculty sabbaticals, a sentiment backed by the president of Iowa’s largest public employees’ union, in an unusual alliance. But professors said the savings Republicans are promising won’t materialize, and…

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New Pension Initiative Could Override Regents’ Action

Byuclafaculty

I have noted in prior posts that UC’s plans for its retirement program could be overridden by a ballot initiative. A new pension ballot initiative is in the works. In the past, no pension initiative made it on to the state ballot. The closest such an initiative has come was in 2005 as part of the governor’s “Year of Reform” effort. In that case, the initiative was pulled due to a controversy over the impact on survivor benefits of public safety workers. While it costs only $200 to file an initiative, getting the signatures in practice requires hiring signature gathering…

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December Brings a Special Legislative Session on the State Budget

Byuclafaculty

One of Governor Schwarzenegger’s last major actions was to call an emergency session on the state budget. Although he is a lame duck at this point and will be out of office in early January, the legislature begins anew in December. The state is carrying a legacy debt of about $6 billion in the general fund (i.e., the fund is projected to close on June 30, 2011 with a negative balance of -$6 billion). A projected operating deficit on a workload basis for next year – the year beginning July 1, 2011 – is about $19 billion. Of course, we…

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Regent Gould Talks About Pensions, Tuition, Concerns About Creating New Programs, and Anderson Self-Sufficiency

Byuclafaculty

UC Regents Chair Gould Talks Funds, Pension Plan Jordan Bach-Lombardo, November 30, 2010, Daily Californian http://www.dailycal.org/article/111368/uc_regents_chair_gould_talks_funds_pension_plan The Daily Californian interviewed UC Board of Regents Chair Russell Gould – who previously served as director of the California Department of Finance from 1993 to 1996 – on Nov. 23 about the University of California’s pension fund, which is facing significant changes due to its multibillion dollar funding deficit. Since the state halted contributions to the pension fund in 1990, the fund’s liabilities grew as its assets shrank, resulting in a $14 billion deficit as of August 2010. The regents voted in September…

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Contract Between UC, Academic Student Employees Challenged

Byuclafaculty

Inside Higher Ed points to this article today: Contract between UC, academic student employees challenged (excerpt) By TOVIN LAPAN – Santa Cruz Sentinel, 11/29/10 SANTA CRUZ – A significant movement has emerged among the University of California’s academic student employees to not ratify the agreement reached by UC and union negotiators two weeks ago. On Nov. 16, after negotiating since June, representatives from UAW 2865, which represents over 12,000 teaching assistants, graduate student instructors, readers and tutors on UC campuses, reached a tentative agreement with UC on a new contract. Union members on various campuses who are unsatisfied with the…

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Academic Council Endorses Yudof Plan on Retirement Benefit Changes

Byuclafaculty

The Academic Council has endorsed the Yudof proposals for changes in post-employment benefits (pension, retiree health care) that will presumably be adopted by the Regents at the December special session. Below is the text of a letter confirming the endorsement. I have verified that the letter is a public document, although – at this writing – it has not yet been posted on the systemwide Senate website. November 24, 2010 MARK YUDOF, PRESIDENT UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Re: Post-Employment Benefits Dear Mark: I am pleased to advise you that at its meeting on November 22, 2010, the Academic Council unanimously endorsed…

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Presentation Available on Replacement of the UCLA Faculty Club

Byuclafaculty

Earlier posts discussed the plan to replace the current UCLA Faculty Center building with a larger convention/hotel type facility. A meeting with Sam Morabito was held in the Faculty Center on Oct. 20 – which yours truly could not attend – but it was videoed and put on the Faculty Center website. Since the existence of the Faculty Club is in peril (although it is eventually supposed to be incorporated into the new building), I have captured the video from the live-stream it preserved it in four parts. That way, the video will be preserved – and whatever promises are…