Gibson supporter claims,"VTA pensions are bankrupting VUSD!"

Our ANTI friend, Plain Truth, of the richly ironic self chosen name recently claimed that the Vista Teachers Association negotiated pensions that will bankrupt our school district. I have answered him a bit sarcastically because he is so infamous for never saying anything about the VTA, VUSD teachers, or our VTA president that is true. In fact if he writes anything on those three subjects, it is certain to be just the opposite of what he wrote. In a reason post to the North County blogs, he claimed this with create authority as he had a "source on the school board" so he was certain that the VTA was bankrupting the VUSD with its pensions. Gee, I wonder who his source could be?

Since Plain Truth has written passionately in support of Jim Gibson in the past, I will jump to a couple of conclusions. The first is obvious. Jim Gibson is the source. Second Jim Gibson has made up another tall tale about our fine teachers for his own political advancement and spread that tale among his ever declining supporters. His latest lie apparently is in regards to teacher pensions. His boy, Plain Truth, repeats that lie with the certainty of cult convert about his cult leader.

I have heard Jim spin tales. He is very very good at it. He sounds very sincere as he tells his tales. He is a master at making up stories that will really outrage his gullible audiences while portraying himself as the lone bulwark against this or that evil that he has falsely charged school teachers with.

This technique of the tall tale with Jim Gibson as the hero has worked to get Jimmy money and votes in the past. The more he talks, the more he makes up. He just can't help himself. The more made up stories he tells, the more risk that his supporters will find out how basically dishonest he is. They can and do. This is one of the reasons that he has fewer and fewer supporters.

My response below to the out right lie that teachers get their pensions from their local school districts. The pensions or retirement of course comes from the California State Teachers Retirement Fund. The fees and charges are set by CalSTRS for the entire state. Teachers do not negotiate their pensions with their local districts. Something that Jim Gibson after nearly twelve years on the school board apparently has never taken the time to find out. (Just like he never visits school sites, does not know the names of the schools in the district, let alone the names of site administrators or teachers.)


con no more said on: May 1, 2010, 7:52 pm
I must congratulate Plain "Truth" for actually referring to something substantive. Of course he shows with his post that he has no understanding of how the State Teacher Retirement System works. But still it is an improvement over his usual opposite land posts that seem to not be grounded in any fact based realities at all.

Yes, I was an employee of VUSD when I retired.

VUSD was the fourth school district I worked for. Each of the school districts paid part of my retirement into STRS. I paid the other part. My years of service in each of those districts counted towards my total STRS retirement because STRS is a STATEWIDE program that every public school district MUST participate in.

The local districts do not decide how much to pay into STRS for their employees, neither do the employees decide how much to pay into the STRS fund for themselves. STRS management in consultation with fiscal advisers makes that decision for ALL California public school districts statewide and all California public school certificated employees statewide. CalSTRS mandates the exact amount that local school districts and their certificated employees must contribute.

Before you believe your 'source' on the board who provided you with this budget item, you might consider his track record for veracity or the lack thereof.

Here are a couple of web addresses to visit for credible information about teacher's "pensions".

State Teachers Retirement System
http://www.calstrs.com/

And even better a document on their site that compares public and private pensions

http://www.nirsonline.org/storage/nirs/documents/final_out_of_balance_report_april_2010.pdf

Since you are repeating propaganda points, I assume you are aware of a nationwide effort to defame and then defund all public pensions. A few billionaires (Howard Ahmanson and the Kock brothers) who do not want to pay their fair share of taxes for the benefits they receive as US citizens are funding propaganda mills to generate misleading information about public pensions. Then AM radio conmen who call themselves "opinion makers" are hired to repeat these lies on air over and over again. The pay of these radio conmen depends on how successful they are at convincing their ill informed audiences to believe the lies generated by the billionaire's various propaganda mills. You obviously have been exposed to one or more of these conmen.