It was 1995 when Appropriation Committee Spokesmen were called to the Governor’s office for a brief on the state employee pay raise bill.
We were told that in return for a freeze on salaries for one year, their pensions would be increased.
I was a newspaper junkie then and had read what the Missouri legislature had done on pensions.
They had converted it from defined benefit pension to one-half defined benefit and one-half defined contribution.
I asked the Governor’s people why we could not do the same.
The short answer was “No.”
The deal had been struck and the briefing was just window dressing.
The pension part of the deal got Jim Edgar off the hook for paying big bucks during his term.
You can see the result below:
