I’m Bill Schrier and I write this blog. The members of the Seattle City Employees Retirement System (SCERS) recently elected me as a member (trustee) of the Board of Administration which oversees the Retirement System. That Board has seven members. The Retirement System has over 21,000 members, assets of over $4 billion, and disburses almost $300 million a year in benefits to retired City employees or their beneficiaries. The Board’s agendas, minutes and other information such as Annual Reports, Financial Statements and Valuation studies are all public information and online here.
All that online material is full of numbers and jargon. In one sense that’s good – I believe SCERS is quite well managed. Finances fell into a real hole in 2010. The Retirement System, funded at over 100% in 2000 and still funded at 92.4% in 2008, fell to 62.0% by 2010. Yes, there was the 2008 recession, but SCERS finances were quite poorly managed. Indeed, only one other major municipal pension system in the United States performed worse. In the twenty-teens (2010 to 2019) SCERS leadership changed. The new leadership hired professional investment managers. As a result, funding improved to the present 76%, not great, but on a recovery trajectory.
Investment terminology and statistics are important to managing four billion dollars, but often not intelligible to most of us, including me. With this blog, I hope to give insight into the decisions of the SCERS Board and the data behind them. I’ll try to explain my votes on those decisions, and the logic (or gut feeling!) behind the votes. And I’ll also be posting about other aspects of “retirement” including its joys and challenges.
My family and I live in West Seattle. I love this City, and I’m proud to live here. I sometimes disagree with the decisions and actions of Seattle’s Mayor and City Councilmembers. That was also true when I was a City employee. Asked by friends and neighbors about the actions of the mayor and council, I would often just shrug and say “nobody elected me”. BUT, in terms of the City’s Retirement System, that’s no longer true – you DID elect me. I will take that responsibility seriously, knowing, for some decisions, the City Council and Mayor often have the last word.
Contact me via email. Personal: bill@schrier.org. Official: bill.schrier-c@seattle.gov.