Voting is May 8 & 9. All active TRS members will be able to vote. Voting will be done electronically. Check your DOE email for details and instructions.
There seven Trustees, three elected by in service TRS members, two appointed by the mayor, one each by the comptroller and the PEP (central school board).
* Tier 6 can only be changed by the governor and the state legislature
* The TDA has six options plus a fixed option, the monthly meetings report on the performance of the options, trustees do NOT determine what to buy or sell
* The fixed rate option was part of a negotiation and resulted in a substantial salary increase, can only be changed by an act of the legislature
The Trustees currently work with the UFT to increase services to members, a secure and user friendly website, time processing of pension info, etc.
To elect a member whose goals are not within its job responsibilities is foolish, and, dangerous.
Twenty years working within the UFT pension department is a quality I admire, “jumping to the front of the line” is chutzpah
Peter, your candidate's campaign literature also talks about the Tier 6 fight. (Although, unlike Ben, she was actually around and situated to fight it before it came out, and yet here we are - but I digress). By your logic, wouldn't electing her therefore mean electing a member whose goals are not within their job responsibilities, and therefore 'foolish' and 'dangerous?' Of course not, because TRS reps are uniquely positioned to situate the pension and our members for a pension reform fight.
Nick, as I have mentioned before, on many different posts, Christina has the all around experience in the pension department that Ben does not have. Yes, he has a math background but how does that translate? As you well know, Tom Brown was a Spanish teacher before he became a trustee, David Kazansky was a music teacher before he became a trustee, Debra Penny was a teacher for over 20 years before she became a trustee. All of them were part time pension reps as well. Where was your indignation when they were elected? Where were your complaints then? We have a multi billion dollar pension fund, thanks to those TEACHERS. Your argument is flawed.
Ben and Christina have different types of experience. Ben's experience, I'd argue, is more relevant to the position than Christina's experience as advertised. Whether or not someone without a math or financial background can become effective in a TRS role, I think it's fair to point out that Ben has worked in a capacity similar to what this job entails. I think that experience is more valuable than experience working in an office specific to our pension but doing much different types of work. Add to that that Ben has demonstrated his expertise in calculating, designing, and implementing member-facing presentations the likes of which we've never seen in typical TRS events, and it's clear that by all accounts, he is well suited for the job. Whether someone can also be good at the job, despite not having Ben's experience, is besides the point. We know that Ben will be good, because he's directly shown it to us. To me, that's valuable - and it's one of many reasons I'm voting for Ben today.
I'm going to disagree with you because in fact all of our teacher member trustees have ben teachers that started in the pension department working with members. Ben has never done that.
As far as the argument that Ben is making presentations, the, "likes of which we've never seen" is just plain silly. All of the videos that are on the UFT website regarding pension were done by Christina. Have you bothered to watch any of them? All of the HFC workshop presentations both Non-medicare and Medicare were done by Christina. All of the different Tier Workshops were done by Christina. They've all got pertinent information that is explained in a precise and CLEAR way.
All in all, what you're saying Nick is that Ben has shown us that he's really good at making Power point presentations. I love a good power point but I'm still voting for Christina.
To work for the pension department, realistically Ben would have to join Unity, which would defeat the purpose of his candidacy. Ben has Wall Street experience, but some Unity people have suggested that communicating things to members is more the gig, hence me mentioning his presentation skills (to me, those are far less relevant than his financial and quantitative skills). Here's that presentation - you'll notice for the first time we actually have an accurate quantification of how much Tier 6 loses relative to Tier 4. For members who start right out of college, we're talking over a million dollars and almost a decade of their lives. Read more here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MUG48GVRmxHWUy-2kqfTMuxJvc5uprCz/view
There seven Trustees, three elected by in service TRS members, two appointed by the mayor, one each by the comptroller and the PEP (central school board).
* Tier 6 can only be changed by the governor and the state legislature
* The TDA has six options plus a fixed option, the monthly meetings report on the performance of the options, trustees do NOT determine what to buy or sell
* The fixed rate option was part of a negotiation and resulted in a substantial salary increase, can only be changed by an act of the legislature
The Trustees currently work with the UFT to increase services to members, a secure and user friendly website, time processing of pension info, etc.
To elect a member whose goals are not within its job responsibilities is foolish, and, dangerous.
Twenty years working within the UFT pension department is a quality I admire, “jumping to the front of the line” is chutzpah
Peter, your candidate's campaign literature also talks about the Tier 6 fight. (Although, unlike Ben, she was actually around and situated to fight it before it came out, and yet here we are - but I digress). By your logic, wouldn't electing her therefore mean electing a member whose goals are not within their job responsibilities, and therefore 'foolish' and 'dangerous?' Of course not, because TRS reps are uniquely positioned to situate the pension and our members for a pension reform fight.
Nick, as I have mentioned before, on many different posts, Christina has the all around experience in the pension department that Ben does not have. Yes, he has a math background but how does that translate? As you well know, Tom Brown was a Spanish teacher before he became a trustee, David Kazansky was a music teacher before he became a trustee, Debra Penny was a teacher for over 20 years before she became a trustee. All of them were part time pension reps as well. Where was your indignation when they were elected? Where were your complaints then? We have a multi billion dollar pension fund, thanks to those TEACHERS. Your argument is flawed.
Ben and Christina have different types of experience. Ben's experience, I'd argue, is more relevant to the position than Christina's experience as advertised. Whether or not someone without a math or financial background can become effective in a TRS role, I think it's fair to point out that Ben has worked in a capacity similar to what this job entails. I think that experience is more valuable than experience working in an office specific to our pension but doing much different types of work. Add to that that Ben has demonstrated his expertise in calculating, designing, and implementing member-facing presentations the likes of which we've never seen in typical TRS events, and it's clear that by all accounts, he is well suited for the job. Whether someone can also be good at the job, despite not having Ben's experience, is besides the point. We know that Ben will be good, because he's directly shown it to us. To me, that's valuable - and it's one of many reasons I'm voting for Ben today.
I'm going to disagree with you because in fact all of our teacher member trustees have ben teachers that started in the pension department working with members. Ben has never done that.
As far as the argument that Ben is making presentations, the, "likes of which we've never seen" is just plain silly. All of the videos that are on the UFT website regarding pension were done by Christina. Have you bothered to watch any of them? All of the HFC workshop presentations both Non-medicare and Medicare were done by Christina. All of the different Tier Workshops were done by Christina. They've all got pertinent information that is explained in a precise and CLEAR way.
All in all, what you're saying Nick is that Ben has shown us that he's really good at making Power point presentations. I love a good power point but I'm still voting for Christina.
To work for the pension department, realistically Ben would have to join Unity, which would defeat the purpose of his candidacy. Ben has Wall Street experience, but some Unity people have suggested that communicating things to members is more the gig, hence me mentioning his presentation skills (to me, those are far less relevant than his financial and quantitative skills). Here's that presentation - you'll notice for the first time we actually have an accurate quantification of how much Tier 6 loses relative to Tier 4. For members who start right out of college, we're talking over a million dollars and almost a decade of their lives. Read more here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MUG48GVRmxHWUy-2kqfTMuxJvc5uprCz/view
How am I able to vote. Is this for retirees to vote on? I have not received anything so Im a bit confused here.
Ironically, retirees are not able to vote in the TRS election, despite being in the situation of currently collecting pensions.