Current issue is the collection of 14,000 signatures on a Multnomah County initiative before July 2, 2004
Multnomah County Counsel claims that the proposed ordinance covers more than one subject and refuses to draft a ballot title.
This initiative petition seeks to compel Multnomah County to comply with state law that excludes the payment of any public money for calculated actuarial liabilities for the public employee pensions. This initiative also compels the County to reclaim more than one hundred million dollars that were unlawfully transferred to PERS. The text of the proposed ordinance (FOR MULTNOMAH COUNTY ONLY) is set out in full below:
PDF Petition Form To Sign And Send
PDF Optional Back Page SAVE SCHOOL FUNDING
If there is anyone who would like to formally gather signatures on a standard ten person form then I will need to create the form and obtain approval. Send me email. Otherwise I will just print a bunch of the above petitions and then get exercise dropping them off at people's houses.
In October 2003 I sued the state on the Measure 29 state bond issue of 2 billion dollars and the court ultimately ruled against me claiming that I merely had a policy disagreement. If bold violations of law, when done by government officials, are immune from accountability then I do not know how else to raise the issue other than through changing that policy. But if an official will still be free to disregard the new policy then there seems to be no point. The point is that it is circular reasoning.
The overall cost to the state of the theft is several billion dollars. And yes it is theft. The County Counsels and the Judges each stand to gain in excess of 100,000 dollars each by simply forgetting that the law was changed in 1999 in the height of the stock market bubble as the PERS folks wanted to lock in all the future gains. They have a conveniently short memory and no one, not even the Republicans, have the will to call them on it. No lawyer wants to effectively piss on a judge or a local government official if they might have to one day ask for a favor.
Do not be shy nor afraid to sign. If you are afraid of doing something wrong by signing then you have already had your free speech rights chilled. That is of course why the Secretary of State and others want to make such a big deal about initiatives. Part of my goal is to demonstrate that poor people can still advocate for public education even against an army of politically connected folks who claim to be advocating for public education while they keep shoveling more money into their pockets.
The Portland School Board folks have threatened to close the schools for 5 weeks next school year if either of the Multnomah County Income Tax issues are repealed. They will do this even though the Oregon Constitution forbids this foolish act.
I will cringe every time I hear of million dollar checks being written to public employee retirees.
PDF Letter To Minnis May 21 -- go for the juggler vein . . .
petition@ronledbury.comTHIS IS WHAT WAS DELIVERED TO THE COURT ON JULY 6, 2004
PDF Amicus Curiae brief (July 6, 2004) to the Consolidated PERS Case(Strunk) at the Oregon Supreme Court on the 2003 PERS Reforms