watchdog

Monday, February 16, 2009

WHY IS THE MEDIA NOT REPORTING ON OVER $3.5 BILLION DOLLARS OF UNFUNDED OPEB PROMISES?

With almost $800 billion dollars of bailout funds just voted by Washington politicians, it is easy to understand why the local media continues to not report on our local and state politicians who have made promises to public employees about retiree health care and retiree life insurance which they have no intention of funding for the long term. $3.63 billion is pin money in this absurd spending world.


A local Memphis School Board member asked me recently why I did not report on the unfunded OPEB (Other Post Employment Benefits) figure of the Shelby County School System. I did then ask them for this information and they promptly reported that their unfunded OPEB liability was $548 million bringing the total of the unfunded OPEB liability to $3.63 billion dollars for the City of Memphis, the Memphis School System, the Shelby County government, the MLGW and the Shelby County School System.


This got me to thinking about the rest of the state of Tennessee and I wonder what the total is for the entire state of Tennessee and then for the entire country. Add in Medicare, Social Security, the coming universal health care, etc. etc. etc. and you have to conclude that there is no promise that politicians will not make as long as long as you keep voting them into office.


In case you don’t remember, the local $3.63 billion dollar problem has been caused by local politicians promising to pay 70 to 75% of retirees’ health care cost without putting the money aside to pay for it in the long term. We must solve this problem by cutting this promise by 5% a year for the next 14 years so that the retirees can prepare their lives for other medical insurance. To continue to ignore this problem is unconscionable.


I have attached a file showing the relevant pages from the five actuarial reports with the unfunded figure shown. Also I have attached the five full actuarial reports.


POLITICAL DIVISION OPEB UNFUNDED LIABILITY
City of Memphis $823,000,000
MLGW $709,000,000
Shelby County $353,000,000
Memphis City Schools $1,250,000,000
Shelby County Schools 548,000,000

Total $3,683,000,000


Click here to see the relevent pages from the complete OPEB reports shown below


Click here to see the OPEB actuarial report for the Memphis City Schools


Click here to see the OPEB actuarial report for Shelby County


Click here to see the OPEB presentation for the City of Memphis


Click here to see the OPEB actuarial report for the Shelby County Schools


Click here to see the OPEB actuarial report for the MLGW

2 Comments:

  • unbelievable!

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4:10 PM  

  • It’s funny how Rep. Bart Gordon calls himself a “blue dog” but is basically walking in lock-step with the expansion of government while also wasting taxpayer money on trips to Europe for him and his wife.

    http://tinyurl.com/cwe5wb

    mB

    By Blogger Michael J. Bernard, at 10:48 PM  

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