A signature goal of Governor Brown has been public employee pension reform. This is conceptually and politically linked to his budget initiative. Today the governor and legislative leaders announced a compromise agreement. It is possible that this will be quickly enacted and signed as the session closes in the next few days. This package is significantly scaled back from his original proposals.

Since it is legislation and not a constitutional amendment, it does not compel UC to act. In fact, many, but not all, of the reforms have already been included in the new tier of UCRP (or were unnecessary in the case of UCRP in the first place). Nevertheless we should follow these developments and keep in mind that attempts to propagate them into additional public employee groups, including UC, via political pressure or constitutional amendment are quite possible.

Governor Brown Announces Pension Reform Agreement.

Summary of the Conference Committee Report on Public Employee Pensions.

The most recent CUCFA letter on pension reform.

Joe Kiskis
Vice President for External Relations
Council of UC Faculty Associations

Eric Hays
Executive Director
Council of UC Faculty Associations