Detroit employee pension funds are ready for a well-funded battle in coming weeks and months, Robert Snell reports in The Detroit News.
The city’s two pension funds have amassed $5 million to fight attempts by Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr to cut retiree benefits or seize control of a system that produces some of the city’s biggest bills.
Detroit’s two pension funds quietly created the war chest earlier this year in a preemptive move aimed at combating changes to a pension system worth $5.1 billion and targeted for a restructuring.
The news quotes Mark Diaz, a trustee on the police and fire pension fund and president of the Detroit Police Officers Association union:
“We have to protect the system at all costs. We have to take a very defensive stance.”
But stashing away $5 million for expected court fights against Orr and the state "is a gamble because the money could pay for a year of benefits for more than 166 retirees," Snell notes.
