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Democratic Party of Milwaukee County

170 S. 2nd Street


Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53204

Dear Executive Board Members:

I am writing to request that the Democratic Party of Milwaukee County and the Democratic
Party of Wisconsin act under Article VIII of the Milwaukee County Party Constitution to either expel
or censure Milwaukee County Executive and Party member, Chris Abele, for his decision on
Monday, February 16th to veto the 14-2 vote by the Milwaukee County Board to protect the
pensions of over two hundred Milwaukee County retirees. This decision demonstrates Abeles true
colors and reveals that his personal platform is fundamentally at odds with the beliefs of the
Democratic Party.
The 2014 Democratic Party Platform states that [o]ne of the primary jobs of government is
to ensure that everyone can lead dignified, healthy and fulfilling lives. It states that the Party will
ensure that everyone receives fair and equal treatment under the law with an explicit
understanding that senior citizens . . . face formidable challenges. Specifically, the Platform clearly
requires that [p]ension and other retirement funds must be strictly safeguarded and responsibly
managed through regulation.
Over the last ten months, Chris Abele has violated these Party pillars and upended the lives
of over 200 retirees by unnecessarily threatening to take away their pensions despite the fact that
some of his victims had been retired for over two decades and were living on a fixed income. For
example, over 40% of the affected retirees relied on the Countys advice to invest in a pension
program using their retirement savings. Had they opted to use cash instead, like hundreds of other
retirees, their pension benefits would have been the same, but they would not have been
threatened by Abeles attack. Instead, Abele used the Countys accounting error as an opportunity
to collect over $26 million in past pension payments in a self-created pension scandal.
Chris Abele was caught with his hand in the Milwaukee pension scandal cookie jar, but the
media coverage regarding his actions has been extremely biased due to the history of pension
scandals in Milwaukee and the overwhelming influence of Abeles family fortune; however, the facts
below will demonstrate that Abeles actions exhibit a fundamental rejection of the principles of the

Democratic Party in a naked attempt to catapult himself politically on the backs for elderly retired
County workers a la his ally, Scott Walker.
Back in April 2014, Chris Abele was notified of an unresolved pension issue that was left
over from the Scott Walker regime. The issue had been dormant since 2007 as the County was
awaiting instructions from the IRS about how to resolve their accounting error. Upon this
revelation, County Executive Abele directed a letter to be sent to the over 200 affected retirees
informing them of imminent changes to their pensions. No further information was provided and
retirees were informed that more information would be provided in September, five months later.
Along with the letter, Chris Abele did an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel,
which led to the April 23rd article entitled, "Milwaukee County Demands Pension Repayments
Because of 'Buyback' Errors." For those retirees, that article added context to the cryptic letter they
received that week. That context horrified the retirees because Abele was essentially threatening
to send a debt collector to recoup pension money that had been spent decades ago.
After receiving no additional information from the County Executive or the Pension Board, a
group of retirees went directly to Chris Abele's office to demand answers. Their action can be seen
here or in this MJS article. The County Executive purposely cancelled his appearance that evening
to avoid meeting the retirees.
There was practically no contact or new information provided to these retirees between the
May Finance Committee meeting and the December Milwaukee County Finance Committee meeting
except for a letter sent in September notifying them that a resolution had been delayed with no
future timeline provided.
It was revealed in July, but not explained to the retirees until December, that the County had
two options for resolving the buy-in/buy-back situation:
Option 1 would be to change three ordinances to retroactively put the pension investments
in compliance with the IRS rules. Option 1 would have no cost to taxpayers and had been endorsed
by the Pension Board because the fund had already included the retirees in their actuarial
calculations so continuing to pay them would have no impact on other County retirees.
Option 2 would be to collect past pension payments and cut the future benefits of over 200
retirees, some of whom have been retired for literally decades. Option 2 was endorsed by Chris
Abele when he stated in the April 23rd article that "I'm going to aggressively try to recover

whatever I can." He went on to say that collecting the payments was "important to taxpayers and
other retirees."
However, Abele's initial plan to collect over $26 million in past pension payments would
have harmed taxpayers because over $20 million of that $26 million would have been uncollectible
based on a 6-year statute of limitations on the collection of pension payments and the County
would owe the Pension fund the full $26 million if they couldnt collect that money from the elderly
and even the estates of deceased retirees! Therefore, Abele's initial position would have cost
taxpayers money when an alternative existed that would do no harm to any of the affected parties
and would have allowed the County to honor its obligations. With his expressed reason for
supporting the pension cuts debunked, the only logical reason for Chris Abeles position is his
political ambition.
Since the absurdity of Abele's initial plan was revealed last month, the County Executive has
proposed a compromise plan that would limit the pension theft to only future pension payments.
However, his new plan fails to address the contractual liability of the County due to the fact that the
benefit was offered to employees by the County and the fact that the IRS mistake was the cause of
an oversight by the County's accountants, not the retirees that were given the improper advice. His
new compromise plan would cause 12 retirees to lose their pensions altogether and more than
25% of the retirees would lose over 20% of their future pension benefits.
Abeles plan was unanimously rejected by the Milwaukee County Finance committee and
Option 1 was adopted unanimously by the Committee and approved by a vote of 14-2 by the full
Milwaukee County Board, including radical conservative Deanna Alexander.
Chris Abeles pension theft plan has been completely exposed by the Milwaukee County
Board, but his compromise is still considered reasonable in the eyes of the public due to the
comments of Chris Abele and the biased reporting on the issue by pension scandal profiteers from
the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (Dave Umhoefer) and Urban Milwaukee (Bruce Murphy).
Thankfully, the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors voted to override Chris Abeles
veto, but the threat remains of an influential elected Party member willing to damage the
reputation of the Democratic Party by actively advocating for positions that are in fundamental
opposition to the Partys Platform.

I urge this Executive Board to vote to expel or censure Chris Abele due to his failure to
ensure that Milwaukee County government treats their retirees fairly and equally under the law.
Chris Abele has failed to allow over 200 retirees to continue to lead dignified, healthy, and fulfilling
lives. He has instead put their lives on hold for nearly a year and placed a dark cloud of financial
ruin above their heads in their most vulnerable years. Chris Abele must be held accountable for
attempting to break the commitments his County made to these retirees. I appreciate your
consideration and look forward to a hearing on this matter.

Respectfully Submitted,
Dennis Hughes
Democratic Party of Milwaukee County Member
262-455-1542

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