To no one’s surprise, two actuarial consultants told city officials this week that Alton’s police and fire pension funds are in poor shape, and offered no definitive solution to the problem.
“We have this conversation every year or two years, but what do we do about it?” asked Alderman Jim Ryan, 1st Ward at Monday’s meeting of the aldermanic Committee of the Whole. “Nobody knows.”
Mayor Brant Walker said city departments have cut their budgets deeply so as to increase pension contributions, but Ryan said the money still is not there to fully pay for the costs.
One of the consultants, associate partner Andrew Witte of AON Hewitt in St. Louis, said the city should put more money into the two funds. After a court forced Alton to pay more of its obligation after decades of falling short, it has increased its payments in the past few years.
Still, those years of not meeting its obligation has put the city behind by $85,371,666 for the two funds as of last March 31, according to the most recent city audit.
Matt Williams, retired Alton fire captain who serves on the Firemen’s Pension Board, expressed his concerns at the meeting.
“What worries us is $3 million comes in, and $3.7 million is going out. Our investments can’t grow. Everything those guys gave you are assumptions,” referring to Witte and his fellow consultant Matt Rustige. Williams asked the city to sit down and discuss the problem with pension board representatives.