On Friday, I came across an article in the LA Times entitled “Pension Fund Won’t Invest in Big Donors”. Here's the link to the story!

The discussion revolved around how current gubernatorial candidate Angelides and our current state controller Steve Westly steered pension investments toward corporations that were giving them the biggest donations in the Democratic Primary for Governor. It got me thinking a lot about the future of pensions, but more importantly, is there consistency between what teachers and and other public employees’ positions are and what is in the best interest of their retirement investments?

Do public employees even know what CALSTRS or CALPERS are investing in?

Here are just some examples.

• California Teacher’s Association supports Senate Bill 840, which calls for Universal Health Care Coverage, yet over 2 billion dollars in retirement funds are located in the Texas Pacific Group, which supports biotechnology firms that would hinder Teachers’ retirement return if there were no longer profits/returns to be had.

• The California Federation of Teachers supported proposition 87, which encourages cleaner energy by taxing oil & gas company profits, yet CALSTRS currently has 50 million dollars in a Limited Partnership entitled, Energy Spectrum Partners IV LP, which has invested between 15 and 50 million in oil and gas and recently touted a huge venture investment in Forrest Drilling Company LLC. Also, CALSTRS has 25 million invested in Nogales Investors, which has invested a significant portion of it’s portfolios in Alfaleisure, a maker of less than gas efficient Motorhomes.

I don’t mean to pick on teachers at all and I’ve reviewed the portfolio menu for CALPERS as well and have seen investments in FOX news affiliates, Exxon, NAFTA based companies in Mexico and outsourcing firms in China and India.

So, I welcome a discussion on this topic as I am no expert.

Should teachers and public employees insist on consistency of their public advocacy with their retirement dollars?

Should these Boards’ investment decisions be controlled by the political consistency of it’s members?

How would you feel if you were advocating a political position, but your retirement was dependent on the position you opposed?

I welcome your thoughts.

Scott Blough