The California Public Employees’ Retirement System pension fund earned only a 2.4% return last year, well below the 7.5% annual return it must make to keep the fund solvent. CalPERS points out that if you look at the five year average, they’re still up. Alison Vekshin of Bloomberg:
“The $300 billion fund earned 1 percent on public-equity holdings and 1.3 percent in fixed-income investments, said Ted Eliopoulos, chief investment officer. Real estate returned 13.5 percent, while private equity gained 8.9 percent.
“Calpers must average at least 7.5 percent a year to match its assumed rate of return or turn to taxpayers to make up the difference. Calpers is among pensions under pressure to boost investment returns as their unfunded liabilities tripled to almost $2 trillion from 2004 through 2013, according to Moody’s Investors Service.
“’We try not to get too fixated or excited by any one-year return, whether it’s 18 percent from last year or a 2.4 percent return this year,’ Eliopoulos told the pension’s governing board Monday at the start of a three-day meeting in Walnut Creek, a suburb of San Francisco.
“Calpers said it has earned 10.9 percent over a three-year period and 10.7 percent over five years.”
Over at the Bee, columnist Dan Walters notes that the news will supply ammo for supporters of a ballot measure that would require a public vote on new pension increases.
And, speaking of pensions, even the president wants to get in on the action. President Obama has ordered a rule change that will allow California to move forward with setting up a state-run retirement savings plan for private sector employees. Judy Lin, AP:
“The president directed the U.S. Labor Department to make administrative changes by the end of the year that will allow states like California to implement their own retirement programs. The agency will have to craft an exemption enabling states to bypass the federal pension law, called the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.
“Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon hailed the decision to help low-wage workers facing financial hardship as they age.
"’Recognizing that states are leading the way on retirement security, President Obama's action removes the most signification barrier to state action across the country,’ de Leon said in a statement. ‘California, and states that follow our lead, will now be able to ensure tens of millions of hard-working men and women will have a shot at retiring with dignity.’
“De Leon, a Los Angeles Democrat, authored SB1234, which Gov. Jerry Brown signed in 2012, in response to what he called the ‘looming retirement tsunami.’ The bill lays the groundwork for the California Secure Choice Retirement Savings Program, which directs employers to withhold 3 percent of their workers' pay unless the employee opts out.”
The state has regained control of inmate health care at Folsom Prison for the first time since 2006, when court-appointed receivers were given the job in the face of endemic failures resulting in unconstitutional conditions for prisoners. Thirty-three other prisons remain in the charge of the receiver, J. Clark Kelso. Paige St. John, LA Times:
“J. Clark Kelso, the overseer of prison medical care and spending, returned responsibility for the health of some 2,400 inmates at Folsom State Prison to California’s corrections department on Monday.
“He promised to restore the same authority for more of the state’s other 33 lockups in coming months.
“’This is the beginning of a significant movement of the case,’ Kelso said in an interview, contemplating an end to nearly a decade of federal intervention spurred by a 2001 lawsuit over prison conditions.”
A bill to allow users of ridesharing services like Lyft and Uber to use carpooling lanes appears to have gone off the road as the Senate Committee on Energy, Utilities and Communications Committee declined to hear the bill. Jeremy White, Sacramento Bee:
[“Sen. Ben Hueso (D-San Diego)]… chair of the committee, who has worked in the taxi industry, said he considered the bill a ‘piecemeal’ approach to regulating ridesharing companies.
“Fast-growing companies that allow amateur drivers to transport people in their personal cars for a fee have caught the attention of lawmakers and put the industry on the defensive in Sacramento, where it has fought bills to bolster insurance requirements and mandate drug and background testing.
“Industry groups took a more proactive approach with Assembly Bill 1360, which would have stipulated that multiple riders could be dropped off at different locations and split the fare. Sponsored by the technology industry groups, the measure also drew the support of environmental organizations and rumbled through the Legislature without receiving a single ‘no”’vote.
“But that progress halted on Monday as the Senate Committee on Energy, Utilities and Communications Committee declined to hear the bill. That shrinks the bill’s chances of advancing before a Friday deadline to pass bills out of policy committees. Proponents said the change came with little warning.”
Senate hopeful Kamala Harris has been quietly gathering donations for her 2016 bid, and has over $3 million on hand for the impending race. Kevin Freking, AP:
“The U.S. Senate campaign of Democratic candidate Kamala Harris says it raised more than $1.6 million during the most recent fundraising quarter that ended June 30.
“Harris serves as California's attorney general and is widely viewed as the frontrunner in the race to succeed U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer. The second quarter haul gives the Harris campaign more than $3 million in the bank…. Harris says more than half of the campaign's contributions came in amounts of $25 or less.”
Imagine this: you’re planning your 6-year old’s birthday party. You order a dinosaur cake from your local Costco, expecting a happy Alley Oop-type decoration in frosting. Instead, you open the box to find a satanic “666” staring you in the face.
Or are you being just a – tiny – bit paranoid?
“Jessica Eckerdt of Queen Creek bought one of her kids a specialty birthday sheet cake from the Superstition Springs Costco in Mesa recently. While singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to her son Nash, Eckerdt noticed that the cake had a hidden message written with the dinosaur’s legs. The three-legged dinosaur that was featured on the cake had ‘666’ written out in blue and green icing….
“Of course it could have been a coincidence that the legs appeared to look like sixes, but at the time the birthday cake was purchased, there were 666 total Costco stores spread across the globe….
“Former Costco employee Allison Logsdon said in a statement via Facebook that the cake with the dinosaur featured shouldn’t look like the cake Eckerdt purchased. She believes that the decorators forgot to put the fourth leg on the cake. Despite what Logsdon says, the three-legged-dinosaur is featured on nearly all of the cakes sold including the ordering photos.”
So there you have it – secret Satanic message, or just sloppy drawing skills? And, can it really be a coincidence that this story originated in Superstition Springs?....
