Today, I sent a letter to each of the House and Senate Transportation bill (S.1813) conferees concerning efforts to add federal pension changes to the final bill.  I urged the conferees to oppose the addition of provisions that would seek increased federal employee contributions or other changes to FERS or CSRS.  We have learned that some parties involved in the negotiations for a compromise bill between the Senate-passed transportation bill and the House-passed transportation bill are attempting to insert provisions that will increase federal employee contributions to their pensions.  Neither the House-passed or Senate-passed bills included changes to FERS or CSRS, but an earlier version of the House Transportation bill used increased pension contributions to offset other spending in the bill.

We sent a message to each conferee stating that provisions regarding federal employee pensions should not even be under consideration in this Transportation bill conference committee.  We reiterated that federal employees have already contributed $75 billion to deficit reduction, more than any other group and urged opposition to any further compensation cuts.  A copy of the letter is attached.

                                                                                    Colleen M. Kelley

                                                                                    National President

LtrtoConfereesonTranspoBill(Attach).pdf