By Steve Gunn
EAGnews.org

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. – The voters of Illinois have a chance to stop the public employee pension problem from getting any worse.

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The Nov. 6 statewide ballot will include a proposal that would require government bodies at the local or state levels to have a three-fifths majority before they can increase pensions for public sector employees, according to a news report from Herald-Review.com.

But public employee labor unions don’t like this idea. They want to maintain the power to secure sweeter pension deals, regardless of the massive debt currently facing the state pension system. And they’ve formed a committee to fight the proposal all the way to Election Day.

Many believe the ballot proposal makes total sense, considering Illinois’ public employee pension system is currently underfunded by about $83 billion. That massive debt means the state owes a lot of pension money to future retirees, but currently has no way of paying it.

The ballot proposal would not provide a way to cover the debt. But it does provide a way to keep the problem from getting worse, according to its supporters. The willingness of elected officials to sweeten pension deals for labor unions over the years helped create the underfunding problem.

“The constitutional amendment will not reduce any existing unfunded pension liability, but it may be enough to make it more difficult for future General Assemblies to add to the existing pension debt with more costly benefits,” said a statement from the Illinois Municipal League, which supports the ballot proposal.

But the unions aren’t willing to accept the amendment without a fight. They have converted their “We Are One” coalition, which was originally established to fight legislative efforts to overhaul the state pension system, into an election committee designed to fight the ballot proposal.

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What is their argument? That the ballot proposal is really an effort to weaken their collective bargaining rights.

“It would strip local control from school boards and city councils, lead to more political gridlock and wasteful court battles, and weaken the collective bargaining rights of workers,” the We Are One coalition said in a prepared statement.

Just wait a minute. It’s union collective bargaining that has pressured officials at the state and local levels to cave into demands for increased pension benefits. The proposal would make it harder for officials to give into that pressure and make the pension problem worse.

Could the unions be more transparent in their selfishness? Do they even care that the state pension system is in big trouble and may not be able to meet the needs of future retirees? If the unions don’t like this proposal, what is their suggestion for getting the situation under control?

Apparently they don’t have one. Their only goal is to keep riding the gravy train for as long as possible.

“The only opponents are people who are willing to do nothing to deal with the pension problem,” said Steve Brown, a spokesman for Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, a Democrat who supports the ballot proposal.

Our guess is that the majority of Illinois voters will choose the opposite approach and approve the amendment as a first step toward fixing a seriously broken state pension system.