CHECK YOUR UBC LM2 TO SEE THE $25,000 PAYMENTS TO THE NCCMP
The Commission has been meeting since 2012 without the knowledge or consent of the 10 million pension plan participants that may suffer the consequences of these proposed changes.
INTERNATIONAL UNION LEADERS ARE ATTACKING THE PENSIONS OF ALL RETIRED WORKERS UNION OR NOT. IN AN ATTEMPT TO COVER FOR THEIR MISMANAGEMENT OF FUNDS,BREACH OF DUE DILIGENCE AND FIDUCIARY DUTY AND THE SHEAR RAPE OF THEIR MEMBERSHIP. AS THEY PETITION THE GOVERNMENT TO ALLOW THEM TO CHANGE ERISA LAW SO THEY CAN STEAL BACK THE PENSIONS OF THEIR MEMBERS THEY CONTINUE TO COLLECT 500,000 SALARIES.TAKE TRIPS TO EXOTIC PLACES AND COLLECT DOUBLE AND TRIPLE PENSIONS.
KNOW YOUR ENEMIES
WHO ARE THESE CARPETBAGGERS??http://www.nccmp.org/
Sean McGarvey, Chairman
Walter Wise, Secretary
William P. Hite, Treasurer
Members of the Board:
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Sean McGarvey, President, Building and Construction Trades Department, AFL-CIO |
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Christopher Brockmeyer, Director of Employee Benefit Funds, The Broadway League |
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Jeffrey Green, Topping Out, Inc. / Davis Erection Company |
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Joseph T. Hansen, President, UFCW |
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Mary Kay Henry, President, Service Employees International Union |
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Edwin D. Hill, President, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers |
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William P. Hite, General President of the United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the Plumbing and Pipe Fitting Industry of the United States and Canada |
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James P. Hoffa, General President, International Brotherhood of Teamsters |
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John McNerney, General Counsel, Mechanical Contractors Association of America |
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John "Rocky" S. Miller, Jr., Cox, Castle & Nicholson |
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Joseph J. Nigro, General President, Sheet Metal Workers' International Association |
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Terence M. O'Sullivan, President, Laborers' International Union of North America |
Plan to Cut Pensions Coming to CongressThe proposal from the National Coordinating Committee of Multi-Employer Plans (NCCMP) is to allow plans to cut existing pensions to 10 percent over the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) limit of about $1,100 per month.The stated purpose of NCCMP , a “Non Profit Trade group”, is to advocate for the financial planning industry, and advise Congress as to changes needed to current retirement law. The changes in law that the NCCMP now recommends stands in sharp contrast to their previous position where they stated that “defined benefit pensions are the only reliable mechanism to ensure lifetime income protection”. As the ERISA law“sunsets” this year, the NCCMP proposes to end “the only reliable mechanism” and replace it with one less reliable and that pays lower benefits. Their proposal shifts investment risk from the employers to the workers. Their Motive in doing what they consider best for plan participants should be questioned.The Board members of the NCCMP in 2011, created The Retirement Security Review Commission, (the Commission). The Commission was to advise Congress on changes to the current ERISA law. The Commission produced a document, “SOLUTIONS NOT BAILOUTS A Comprehensive Plan from Business and Labor to Safeguard Multiemployer Retirement Security, Protect Taxpayers and Spur Economic Growth”. The full document is found at the www.nccmp.org website. I encourage you to read this document and explore the web site, note who is on their Board of Directors.A CONFLICT OF INTEREST AND A STAB IN THE BACK OF THE RETIREES CONTACT Fred Smith 503 281 2600 sfred3@msn.com |
5 comments:
Love the blog. I am in a union and chris broockmeyer is the trustee. I have been doing my research about mpra and how these guys funded it through nccmp. I would like to talk about how you figured this puzzle so i can look into these shady connections myself.
I also would like to know how to do this for another reason. Stop it. What about the council's that work their favorites 2 weeks a month. At full wages they received while on retirement. The way I read the law we cannot work in any related field. Or we can loose our benefits. But an agent can double dip again with the EST's blessing. That's fair right. You know why this happens right. The white ballot. No one is around that are members to see the things going on.
I firmly believe take your vote back and stand strong. If messed with document everything. And go to court.
There are many favorite double dippers. Especially in the Carpenters Union. They do not reward hard work. Rather they reward those that know how to get out of hard work. They look at it this way…. a lazy representative will have the knowledge of how to steal a members money better than a hard working member. Why?
Because with their knowledge of how to steal their own funds from the union, they will surely know how to steal the memberships money.
THINK ABOUT IT! STUPID IS WHAT STUPID DOES !
Effective December 13, 2024, the Southwest Carpenters Pension Trust was renamed
the Western States Carpenters Pension Trust
CARPENTER PENSIONERS
MOST OF YOU'VE BEEN SUPER- CHEATED BY YOUR PENSION PLAN!
If you retired by the end of 2019, you've seen absolutely no increase in your pension since the day it started. No COLA of any kind for you even though inflation was 8% in 2022 alone and 4.7% in 2023 alone. In those two years your pension lost more than 13% of its value. Think that's scary - consider this:
The cumulative U.S. inflation rate from 2000 to 2025 was approximately 88%. That's not an exaggeration - it's reality. https://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm
This means that $1 of that pension you were awarded in 2000 has the purchasing power of only $.53 in 2025. If your “defined benefit” pension started at the beginning of 2000 you have lost 47% of its real value as of 2025.
I am sure that you have felt and are continuing to feel this massive loss of pension value. So what has the Pension Plan and its Trustees done to help you out - For the vast majority of retirees ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! BUT THEY DID DO SOMETHING FOR A VERY SELECT GROUP, NAMELY THESE:
Benefit accruals have been increased retroactively by 50% for the past 10 years (2011-2020) for Participants who were credited at least 1,000 hours and accrued Pension Credit under the Southwest Carpenters Pension Plan during 2020. Additionally, benefit accrual was effectively doubled for all years after 2020.
Even sweeter for those who are essentially on a salary (like “special class” participants who essentially get the maximum number of work hour credits each period) they get a “super maximum” Benefit Accrual Rate up to a maximum of $244.44, as opposed to the $200 maximum for regular carpenters.
So here are some questions you need to ask of your Union agents:
1. How many participants actually were credited for at least 1,000 hours in 2020? There were 67166 participants in the Plan at the beginning of 2021. Only 28334 were active participants at the beginning of the year. So, already nearly 40,000 participants were excluded because they were not active and therefore couldn’t get 1,000 hours in 2021!
2. How many “active” participants who were credited with at least 1,000 hours in 2020 were “special class” participants. These are Union-connected people who are basically on a salary getting maximum pension hours each pay period. Are Union employees like Business Agents “special class” who get max accruals each month - YES. See Summary Plan Description page 13. How about the Carpenter Trustees sitting on the Board of Directors, who are all Union
employees. They are listed as Douglas McCarron, Chairman, Oscar Cordova, Sean Hartranft, Frank Hawk, Jacob Lopez, Josh Raper, Pete Rodriguez and Frank Zambrano. Most of them make about $150,000 or more a year plus a furnished car and an expense account. https://olmsapps.dol.gov/query/orgReport.do?rptId=766144.... Interesting to look at all the payment expenses listed there.
And, since they almost certainly got the 1,000 hours in 2020 it looks like they voted to increase THEIR pension but not YOURS. Also Contractor Superintendents and Assistant Superintendents can be “special class” who also get the pension hours.
3. So if you take away all the special class “salaried” participants who got 1,000 hours in 2020, who is left to qualify for the increase? How many? Versus all the tens of thousands like you, who got nothing in the way of an increase. And how much of the possible 10 year increase did they actually get? If they had 10 years in, they got all of it!
4. The Plan has not provided any information on the number and who actually qualified for the benefit increase, likely because it would disclose that much of the increase went to the people who are already some of the most well-compensated through the Union.
5. As a defined benefit Carpenter Pensioner who has effectively been beaten nearly to death by inflation, you need to be provided with the number who actually qualified for the increase, who they are, how much they got of their potential 10 year retroactive increase, and why the Plan acted as it did. Everyone knows about 13th checks and how that concept is a fair way to address the critical inflation problem that retired pensioners, particularly old-time pensioners, are facing. Maybe more employer contributions are also needed as opposed to living almost entirely off stock market and other financial investments to fund the Plan.
6. Call or talk directly to your Union reps and the Pension Fund Trustees to get the answers you need to these questions AND TO DEMAND A FAIR, EVEN-HANDED ADDED BENEFIT PAYMENT TO HELP EVERYONE. It’s hard to get an actual phone number for the Plan Trustees but they should be available through the Pension Plan Fund Office - Monday-Friday 8:00 am to 5:00 pm (PST) at: (213) 386-8590 or (800) 293-1370; web-pen@csacbenefits.org. According to their website the Regional Council is still at 533 S. Fremont Ave., 10th Flr. Los Angeles, , 90071-1706, Phone: (213) 385-1457, even though the administrative office for the Pension Plan has moved to Union Bank Plaza, 445 South Figueroa Street, Suite 1500, Los Angeles, CA 90071. https://www.csacbenefits.org/ Maybe you should just call your local union, ask these questions, and ask for how to contact the Union Pension Fund Trustees.
7. Your comments on this website demanding fair and open dealings by the Plan with ALL Carpenter retirees can help immensely to remedy the unfairness that has taken place and to help in getting you some financial help on your pension. A United Pensioner action at the Regional Council may be needed to nudge things along.
8. There is a six year statute of limitations for breaches of ERISA if the persons affected don’t have “actual knowledge” of the breach. If they do it is only 3 years. Just receiving a letter from the Plan does not mean you have actual knowledge. You have to have to have read and understood it to have actual knowledge. The Plan has used the law to try to prevent you from having any legal recourse to remedy this gross violation of fairness and equity to the vast majority of its defined benefit pensioners. Concerted political action is perhaps the best way to fix this problem. So join in here by posting your concern and desires to help out. If anyone has any insider information on the details of how this travesty of justice happened, let us know.
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