Market Downturn has Implications for San Diego Pension Fund

By Alison St John / Reporter, KPBS Public Broadcasting

Published October 1, 2008 at 2:01 PM PDT

This story was published more than 15 years ago.

The financial crisis threatens the retirement savings of every San Diegan invested in Wall Street. But a market downturn would be a double whammy for San Diego taxpayers, who are on the hook to make

The financial crisis threatens the retirement savings of every San Diegan invested in Wall Street. But a market downturn would be a double whammy for San Diego taxpayers, who are on the hook to make good on guaranteed public employee pension funds. KPBS reporter Alison St John has more.

San Diego city taxpayers already know that a share of the city's budget has to go into the employees' pension fund.

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But that share would have to grow if the market takes a hit.

David Wescoe, the city's pension fund administrator, says city employee pensions, like most public employee pensions, shouldn't be affected by a market downturn because they are guaranteed.

Wescoe : The crisis more directly impacts the plan employers, the plan sponsors because ultimately it's the employer who has to make good on the benefits, the city of San Diego.

That means the city's budget would have to pick up the tab.

The city's contribution is about $160 million this year.
Wescoe says he won't know whether the city's contribution will have to go up next year until the annual auditor's report next June.

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He says the pension board has already lowered its expectations of investment returns from 8% to 7.75%

Alison St John, KPBS news.

Alison St John

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Alison St John currently serves as a general assignment reporter and occasionally co-hosts KPBS Midday Edition. She fell in love with KPBS Radio when she arrived in San Diego in 1985 and first heard NPR. She has been a voice on KPBS Radio since 1989, and has served as a news reporter for radio, TV and the web, as well as anchoring, hosting, producing and editing. Alison has reported on stories about North County and was based in the KPBS' North County Bureau. Alison covered the metro beat during the critical period of the San Diego City pension crisis, and the education beat while Alan Bersin was the controversial Superintendent of San Diego City School District. She covered health when the industry was converting to managed care and told welfare reform stories in the late 1990s when Clinton was “ending welfare as we know it.” She has covered land use issues extensively, looking at the challenges of meeting a growing population while preserving community character, and developing a better transportation system to meet environmental concerns. She has done many stories on the military in San Diego, and the series she edited on the challenges veterans face returning from active duty to civilian life won “Best of Show” from the San Diego Society of Professional Journalists. She occasionally hosts the KPBS Roundtable and KPBS Midday Edition. Alison has won awards from the San Diego Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press TV and Radio Association, and the California Golden Mike Awards. Alison was born in Tanzania, brought up in Scotland, and earned her degree in psychology and sociology from Durham University in England. Her postgraduate diploma is in student counseling. She worked in England, Nigeria, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and Japan before moving to the United States in 1981. She now lives in Oceanside and enjoys how her community is growing and changing.