City of San Diego Retired Employees Association

October 13, 2020

Board Meeting Minutes

 

NOTES: All votes were unanimous unless otherwise noted.

To adhere to COVID-19 social distancing protocols, the meeting was held via Zoom online meeting service.

Call to Order: The meeting was called to order by President Dick Wilken at 9:15am.

Board Members Present: Jim Baross, Mike Bresnahan, Chris Brewster, Karen Butler, Shirley Hall, Joan Hernandez, Brad Jacobsen, Joan McNamara, Mary Ann Stepnowsky, John Tsiknas, Dave Twomey, Dick Wilken, and Janet Wood

Guests Present: None

AGENDA: There were no additions or changes to the agenda.

PRESIDENT’S REMARKS: None.

MINUTES: The minutes of the September 2020 Board meeting were approved.

TREASURER’S REPORT: Karen reported that there were no expenditures in September; newsletter printing costs will be invoiced in October.

M/S/C to accept the September Treasurer’s Report.

INVESTMENT COMMITTEE REPORT: The Russell 3000 has had an appreciation of 31.95% to date, while the Money Market fund has had an appreciation of 3.88%.

M/S/C to accept the Investment Committee Report.

COMMUNICATIONS: Dave Wood contacted Dick suggesting that REA work to return the City to a council-manager form of government. Most of the Board felt that that horse has long left the barn.

RETIREMENT BOARD REPRESENTATIVE’S REPORT

No report

DISCUSSION/ACTION ITEMS:

1) The Nominating Committee (Mike Bresnahan, Jim Baross, Jean Hughes) reported that all four Board members whose terms are expiring have agreed to run again; they are Brad Jacobsen, Karen Butler, Shirley Hall, and Joan McNamara.

M/S/C to accept the Nominating Committee’s slate of candidates

It was decided to ask the membership to vote on the slate as a whole; if there are objections or there are nominations from the floor, Jim will use Zoom’s polling feature.

2) The recipient of this year’s award for outstanding service to REA will be Janet Wood for her work on the newsletter.

3) Brad was contacted by an REA member who wanted REA to inform members of Carl DeMaio’s support of Barbara Bry for mayor. It was noted that Bry supported Prop B but has since reversed her stand and has voted in favor of legal actions to overturn it.

M/S/C (12-0-1) to stay out of the Mayor’s race

INFORMATION ITEMS: None

COMMITTEE REPORTS

Advocacy: The issues around our having a “footer” on our sponsorship of VOSD’s “Morning Report” were worked out and the footer was added for an additional cost of $500 ($3000 total). There was some objection to Dick authorizing the expenditure without Board notice or approval.

M/S/C (12-0-1) to approve the expenditure of $500 for the footer on “Morning Report”

REA got a lot of recognition and acknowledgment at VOSDs PolitiFest; Dave will get the metrics to see exactly how many people saw our heard about us at the event. We got similar coverage at Restoring Respect and will continue to get exposure in the coming year.

Kudos to Joan McNamara for her profile of REA member June Dudas.

Mike reached out to Jonathan Hayes to see if his organization was interested in producing the newsletter, perhaps on a temporary basis. They will meet and go over the particulars.

The next Advocacy Committee meetings will be October 22 and November 19.

The Board Retreat is December 11 at 9:30.

Membership: No report.

Newsletter: Deadline for the next issue is October 18.

Past President: No report.

Website: No report

OTHER RETIREE/ACTIVE EMPLOYEE ASSOCIATION REPORTS

Retiree Issues Task Force (RITF): SDCERS is still crunching numbers on the Annual Supplemental Benefit and Corbett. REA will have some space on SDCERS Scoop. Medicare rates are going to increase; we will inform members to look for a letter from the Social Security Administration informing them of this.

Retirement Security Roundtable: Being held virtually seems to improve attendance. There was an update on the two pension-related cases that were heard at the California Supreme Court; the California Rule seems to be intact after the decisions.

MEA: No report.

Other Retired Public Employee Associations: No report

PROGRAMS: Dave will provide a list of potential speakers for 2021 at the Board Retreat. Speakers for January and February are in place.

ADJOURNMENT

The meeting was adjourned at 10:30am.

 

Respectfully submitted,

Brad Jacobsen

Secretary