Let Houston Handle Their Own Pensions

Regarding "Houston should be able to handle own pensions" (Wednesday Outlook Pg. A19), former Mayor Bill White revisits the entire sad saga of Houston's pension crisis, but surprisingly spends very little time on the cause, and no time at all on the only realistic solution.  White's only nod to reality in the entire article is one of his opening sentences: "Houston’s pension problems arose from benefit increases adopted in 2001 and based on flawed projections."

Talk about an understatement.  What really happened was that in a proverbial smoke-filled back room and out of the public eye, former Mayor Lee Brown approved a massive, unilateral and completely arbitrary increase in pension benefits for all municipal workers, despite the fact that they had not been promised the increase as a condition of employment, and did not deserve it.

In hindsight, it's clear that this multi-billion dollar fraud should have resulted in criminal convictions and prison time for the perpetrators.  Sadly that's not going to happen. What should happen now, however, is that this phony benefit should be taken away from the retirees now receiving it and denied to all future retirees as well. Houston's pension crisis would be solved.

Nobody can create wealth with the stroke of a pen.  Debt on the other hand - as the culpable Mayor Brown proved - can be created in endless quantities.  That was the premise for this boondoggle in 2001, and it is a fundamental element of Mayor Sylvester Turner's proposed bailout in 2017.

Houston's retirees and current employees need to surrender their ill-gotten gains.  If they refuse, let Houston alone suffer the consequences, as Mayor White suggests. That's the only way to prevent such fraud from being perpetrated again, and the only way to protect the millions of Texas taxpayers outside of Houston that will otherwise get stuck with the tab.

Pete Smith
Cypress, TX