The Oregonian/Oregon Live
by Ted Sickinger
July 18, 2019
A business coalition seeking to tackle Oregon’s pension crisis took another step toward putting two reforms on the ballot in November.
The group, PERS Solutions for Public Services, submitted 1,000 signatures to begin the process of drafting ballot titles for Initiative Petitions 22 and 23. Former Gov. Ted Kulongoski and Chris Telfer, a former Republican legislator from Bend, are the initiatives’ chief petitioners.
Ultimately, to put the initiatives on the November 2020 ballot, the group must collect 112,020 signatures for each measure by July 2020.
Initiative Petition 22 seeks to give newly-hired public employees the option of choosing a 401(k)-style retirement plan financed by matching contributions of 6% of salary each by employees and their employers. Alternatively, new hires could choose to stick with the pension plan, but without the supplementary individual account they get today. They also would be required to contribute 6% of their salary toward the cost of future pension benefits, starting July 1, 2021.
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