Scott Suder and the $14 billion pension albatross

Dear Assembly Republican leggies,

I am greatly humored by those who buy into Scott Suder's argument that he's actually a conservative. Those who have known Suder and followed his career over the years know that Suder is too crippled by a Napoleonic sense of self-interest to meaningfully proclaim any kind of ideological position. And now Suder wants to be majority leader.

So before you cast your vote for Suder for anything, you should ask him about the final day of session last year, when Suder abdicated his legislative responsibilities to take a vacation to Las Vegas. Is that principled, conservative leadership?

You should ask him about his vote for the 2007 budget, which not only raised taxes but also perpetrated an unconstitutional raid on the Patients Compensation Fund.

But I've got one other thing you absolutely need to ask Suder, and it requires a bit of a history lesson first. Allow me to give you a quick tour of 1999 Assembly Bill 495, which was quite possibly the biggest financial boondoggle ever perpetrated on the people of Wisconsin by their elected officials.

Back in 1999, when government was fat and happy and cutting people rebate checks from excess revenue, a bunch of politicians got together in the proverbial smoke-filled room and decided it would be *awesome* for them to improve their own pensions. The jist of the bill was as follows.

The Legislature authorized the "sweetening" of all state employee pensions by increasing the formula factor retroactively for years of service prior to 2000. This number, when multiplied by years of service and final average earnings, is what determines the size of a state employee's pension. In doing so, the Legislature increased pension credits for general employees by 10.31%, and for executive employees (like legislators) by 8.25%.

The bill also increased the limit on the formula benefit from 65% to 70% of an employee's final average earnings. That includes legislators too. So the bill increased legislator's pensions in two different ways. It made each year worth more, and it increased the maximum amount they could collect.

There's an excellent, detailed analysis of the fiscal ramifications that was published by WPRI in its Fall 2003 issue. You conservatives should read it, especially since I know how many of you think I couldn't possibly be on your side some of the time. There's also a more abbreviated summary of the bill's provisions on the UW System website.

The overall cost of this plan, as estimated by WPRI was $14 billion. That's right, billion. Lest you think Tom Ament was the only one helping himself to the wallets of taxpayers, there were a lot of legislators and a Republican governor in Madison that were happy to take you to the cleaners too.

The final vote on this bill in the Assembly was 79-20. A lot of leggies wanted more of your money, obviously. And they were in a hurry, too. AB 495 made its way through the legislature, from introduction to final passage, in five days.

There were 20 legislators in the Assembly who stood up to this financial travesty and voted no. In fact, it's most all of the conservative legislators that you guys on the right adore. Scott Walker. Glenn Grothman. Mark Gundrum. Steve Nass. Joe Leibham. Neal Kedzie. Frank Lasee. In the Senate, Scott Fitzgerald. Bob Welch. Mike Ellis. And let's be clear here. A no vote was the right vote. Said Walker, "Legislators had the benefit of reading [state actuary Scott Dennison's] report from the Joint Survey Committee that raised all kinds of red flags, and they still passed it overwhelmingly."

Where was Scott Suder? He was over there in the ayes. Suder voted to take $14 billion of your money and hand it out to public employees like himself.

So leggies, before you go into caucus and cast your vote for this guy for majority leader, at least one of you should stand up and ask Suder why he voted for this bill, and sided against the most solid conservatives in the Assembly at the time. $14 billion in increased (and largely unfunded) benefits for public employees, and Scott Suder thought that was a good idea.

That's conservative? No, that's self-serving. And don't buy any excuses either. Lots of people voted no on this. Suder wasn't in leadership, so there was no need for him to cast a vote according to anything other his conscience.

In 2003, then Racine County Executive Bill McReynolds said that "the alarming reality of increasing pension benefits across the board is that decision-makers who implemented the plan are not the ones who will be held accountable for paying for it." Yeah, that's true. But it doesn't mean that you can't demand a little accountability this week.

Anyone who's followed Suder's career know that self-serving is Suder's middle name. If he was in your district this fall, he was helping himself out first and helping you out second. You just might not have known it. His legislative record isn't one of a fiscal conservative - it's of a guy who's willing to cast his vote in whatever way is necessary for him to get ahead. He'll gladly vote for higher taxes if it helps him. He'll vote for pension giveaways if it helps him. He'll vote for unconstitutional raids of segregated funds if it helps him. He'll vote for giant ethanol subsidies if it helps him.

So if you want to vote for a guy who thought a $14 billion pension sweetener was a good idea, go right ahead. But when a Democrat stuffs this leadership vote down your throat in the next election cycle, don't say you weren't warned. A vote for Suder is a vote against everything you said in your campaign about accountability and fiscal responsibility.