Curtis Lee: Excessive PFPF junketing at taxpayer expense

[Patricia M. McBride]

This is a subject Curtis devotes a huge amount of time to, and the latest of his revelations came when copies of documents requested on 12/1/2011 finally arrived on  1/23/2012.  Being provided so everyone is better informed about what is going on. 

 

More info on how our tax dollars are spent (and overseen) so "wisely".

 

CTDC Members - On 12/1/11, I had asked for docs from the Police & Fire Pension Fund ("PFPF) concerning travel expenses, for fiscal year 2011 (which ended 9/30/11). On 1/23, I finally got such docs. I have now had a chance to look at them.

They show that during that year, John Keane traveled 13 times to conferences. Bobby Deal, an employee of the JSO, who is chairman of the PFPF Board of Trustees, traveled 9 times to conferences. Nat Glover, trustee, traveled one time to a conference in Vegas (where he supposedly owns property). These conferences were usually 1 - 3 night affairs.

The most commonly traveled to locations were New York (4 conferences amonst them), Miami area (4) , Las Vegas (3), California (3) Chicago (3). Note - Miami and Las Vegas are strange spots to go for investor conferences or to meet with financial firms including investment managers, as most of the big financial firms are in places like NY, Boston and Chicago. However, you surely can guess why one would want to go to conferences in the Miami area or Vegas.

When I managed a defined benefit pension plan, I do not believe that I traveled more than 4 or 5 times a year to such conferences. And so, to the extent my experience is evocative, it suggests that those who run the PFPF are having travel fun on the taxpayers' dime, and perhaps accruing frequent flier miles for their personal use.

And yet, despite all these efforts to educate these men, the PFPF relies INSTEAD on an outside (paid) firm called Summit Strategies to do its investment research, and make recommendations. So, why the need for any such junkets?

Oddly enough, the data provided to me says that the total of such 23 junkets cost the PFPF less than $20,000, whereas the PFPF travel budget for fiscal 2011 was about $78,000. Clearly some data have not been provided to me.

I am going to refer these matters to Kirm Sherman, for when the City audits the PFPF, which hopefully will be later this year. Perhaps his office can figure out the discrepancy. I suspect they will have better luck. Obviously something fairly big is missing, but I know what the PFPF will do to me - under the Sunshine Law - I will have to wait 1 - 2 months if I make a supplemental response, and still the figures probably won't tie out.

I thought you would all be interested. Curt Lee