LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 8-9-12

Good news
Editor: Very good news! Sonoma State University will now have a branch of it’s Osher Lifelong Learning Institute starting this September in Healdsburg. I’ve been taking the SSU-OLLI courses at the main campus for the last 10 years. What a wonderful journey it has been! If you are curious, love learning and want to keep your brain sharp, this is the way to go. The courses cover a full range of subjects from the arts, history, literature, music, science, philosophy,mathematics and so much more. I look forward to having this program here in my own backyard.
There will be an Open House on Thursday, September 13 from 2:00 to 4:00 p.m. at Villa Chanticleer. You can meet the instructors, learn about the courses, mingle with a friendly bunch of people and be a student again.
Marty Berler
Healdsburg
Medication disposal
Editor: Since I just investigated the issue of disposing of unused medications, I was glad to see the commentary in this week’s paper.
However, it’s even easier than the commentary stated. And folks don’t have to wait until September. I hope you will also publish the following info —
Safe disposal of medications at Healdsburg Police Department:
Outdated or unused prescription or over-the-counter pills should NOT be put into the trash or down the toilet. They are harmful to ground water, and water treatment procedures cannot remove all such contaminants.
They can be safely disposed of at the Healdsburg Police Department. All pills should be dumped out of their containers into one Ziploc bag. Remove the label from the pill containers (for privacy reasons), and put plastic containers into your recycling bin.
For liquids, make sure the container is tightly closed and remove the label.
Give pills or liquids to the receptionist in the lobby of the Police Department, 238 Center Street.
They do not take needles.
Jane St. Claire
Healdsburg
Misinformation corrected
Editor: In response to Brad Pacheco’s August 2 letter, indeed over the last 20+ years CALPERS have beaten their broadcast return of 7.55%.  However, over the last 10 years ending 4/30/2012 the total return was 5.9%, over the last 5 years the total return was 0.5% and over the last year the total return was 1.8%.  In these difficult economic times, using the last 30 years performance to forecast the future is probably not a good or prudent strategy.  As T. Rowe Price, the mutual fund company says: “Past performance does not guarantee future results and prudent investment strategies are called for.”
Regardless of the return, the real camel with its head in the tent is the unfunded pension liabilities.  Moody’s investment service estimates that country wide state and local pensions have an unfunded liability of $2 TRILLION dollars.  Paul Volcker, former Federal Reserve Chairman has put the unfunded pension liabilities at $3 TRILLION dollar.  CALPERS advises of their participants, none have zero unfunded liability.  In only 2% of the plans is the unfunded liability less than 25% of the total pension liability.  This is a very big problem and when the pension payments come due it will be the tax payer who is the payer of last resort.
A related CALPERS issue is that they only offer “Defined Benefit Retirements” wherein the benefit continues until the recipient dies.  The government (Federal, State and Local) is one of the last bastions of this kind of plan and the costs are truly open ended.  Industry has gone to an annual retirement contribution plan such as a 401K wherein costs are defined annually and there is no unfunded liability tail.  Will CALPERS offer such a plan in the future or should this be contracted out by the city?
Mr. Pacheco states that I should not scapegoat public employees and pensions for bankruptcies as the costs of pensions are small in comparison to the overall budget.  Is that really true?  If I look at the Healdsburg final budget expenditures for 2010 I find that the total cost of wages is $7.7M or 9.5% of the total budget.  Personal Overhead expenses were $6.8M or 8.4% of the total budget.  I consider this approximately 18% of the budget to be a major expense for each budget cycle and certainly an issue in deciding to pursue bankruptcy.  A January 2012 study has projected that Healdsburg has a projected unfunded pension liability of $26M which would be 32% of the total budget.  By no means a small number
Finally, Mr. Pacheco states that “The real culprit behind the “unacceptable financial situation” are the bad decisions made by city officials, not pensions.”  Based on the above, it would appear that one of the “bad decisions made by Healdsburg city officials” is to stay with CALPERS and their defined benefit plan rather than considering 401K plans used by business to control expenses and limit long term liabilities.
Vernon P. Simmons
Healdsburg