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More Minnesota public employees are staying on the job longer -- a result of the struggling economy and a change in the rules for public workers who have long enjoyed incentives to leave the workforce in their late 50s. Last year, about 60 percent of new retirees from Minnesota's public workforce -- not including public safety workers -- waited until they were 62 or older to retire. Just seven years ago, that figure was 40 percent, according to data from Minnesota's three statewide public pension plans. This trend is expected to accelerate sharply. Within the next decade, there won't be...

Broke Detroit's Pension Fund "Trustees" Use Public Funds To Fund Hawaii Trip Tyler Durden 05/25/2013 12:46 -0400 "When you have city employees, police, and firefighters have taken pay cuts, it doesn't look good," is the somewhat understated response from Detroit's emergency manager to the city's latest debacle. Amid the deepening financial crisis the crumbling region faces, four trustees of its public pension funds spent $22,000 of retirement funds to attend a conference at Waikiki Beach, Honolulu. "It's one of these things we trustees must do to stay on top of the field," is how one of the trustees defended the...

The city of Detroit may be facing a deepening financial crisis but that hasn't stopped four trustees of its public pension funds from spending $22,000 of retirement system funds to attend a conference in Hawaii this week. One well-attended session covered how to avoid front-page scandals. According to presenter Lydia Lee, a pension attorney from Oklahoma, the session touched on a topic familiar back in Detroit: The indictment this spring of two former city pension officials for an alleged $200 million bribery and kickback scheme, in a case that will come to trial next March.

President Obama and his administration now find themselves in the middle of not one but two tough situations: the tragic killing of four Americans at a U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, and the Internal Revenue Service’s scrutiny of tea-party and other conservative groups. At best, they are cases of bad mishandling and embarrassment; at worst, they rise to the level of legitimate and consequential scandals. At this point, the significance of each is more in the eye of the beholder. Liberals and Democrats tend to de-emphasize both affairs, while many conservatives and Republicans think that each rises to the level...

The public paid limited attention to last week’s congressional hearings on Benghazi. Fewer than half (44%) of Americans say they are following the hearings very or fairly closely, virtually unchanged from late January when Hillary Clinton testified. Last October, 61% said they were following the early stages of the investigation at least fairly closely. The national survey by the Pew Research Center, conducted May 9-12 among 1,000 adults, finds that Americans are deeply split over how both the administration and congressional Republicans are handling the situation. Four-in-ten (40%) say the Obama administration has generally been dishonest when it comes to...

NEW YORKA New York City public elementary school has adopted an all-vegetarian menu, serving kids tofu wraps and veggie chili. Public School 244 is the first public school in the city to go all-veggie. The animal-welfare group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals says it might be the first all-veggie public elementary school in the nation. Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott says he's proud of the "trailblazing" school. He ate the new food with children on Tuesday.

Four Pittsburgh firefighters are suing seven companies that manufacture fire trucks or sirens, claiming they've lost hearing due to the blaring sirens. (snip) They're claiming that Mack Trucks Inc., Seagrave Fire Apparatus LLC and five other firms "knew or should have known the products ... were inherently dangerous, defective and hazardous to human hearing." The men claim they've suffered irreversible hearing loss "due to exposure to the intense noise." The firefighters are seeking unspecified monetary damages

Private religious schools perform better than public schools, and public charter schools performed no better than regular public schools, according to a new study by William Jeynes, professor of education at California State University at Long Beach and senior fellow at the Witherspoon Institute at Princeton. Jeynes spoke Monday with The Christian Post about the study. He found that religious, mostly Christian, school students were a full year ahead of students who attend public and charter schools. The results of his research were recently published in vol. 87, issue 3 of the Peabody Journal of Education in an article titled,...

EditorÂ’s Note: Graphic descriptions follow (You were warned). WhatÂ’s that you say about sequestration and consequences of it? Apparently Barack Obama talks about sequestration pains, while he and his family is indulging in vacations at our expense, but thereÂ’s more. In light of the current cases concerning sodomites at the Federal lever seeking to undermine and redefine marriage, the Obama administration is spending $350 million to indoctrinate children sexually. While the White House says sequestration has eliminated funds for children touring the White House, President Obama has no problem spending $350 million federal tax dollars for sexual indoctrination programs starting...

As a 15 year old, I never imagined my activism in politics would translate into controversy for me at school. My name is Benji Backer and I attend a public high school in Appleton, Wisconsin. I have always supported the public school system and plan to do so for the rest of my life. Many Americans who stand up for the public school system and the unions believe there is no attempt to sway opinion or that students with opposing beliefs are singled out. Unfortunately, experiences I have had with harassment and bullying prove that wrong. This is a timeline...

Working for the public good has also worked well for one California county administrator’s bank account. According to reports by several newspapers, Alameda County, in the San Francisco Bay Area, is paying its County Administrator Susan Muranishi, north of $400,000—for life. This includes a generous base salary of $301,000, plus taxpayer-funded deferred pension plans paid for by the county. The pension accounts are set by a formula that multiplies years of service by 2 to 3 percent of the top salary to calculate the benefit, the San Jose Mercury News reports. With 38 years of service under her belt, the...

LAS VEGAS (AP) - A Las Vegas high school teacher who recently won his job back in arbitration after he was fired several years ago has been suspended. The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports 54-year-old John Mannion was sent home from Bonanza High School on Friday after officials learned he faces felony drug trafficking charges. He was arrested last July on suspicion of selling the prescription painkiller Oxycontin to an undercover detective.

The now 20-year-old told state lawmakers her story on Thursday, Feb. 28, urging them to support a bill that would strengthen Minnesota's anti-bullying law. The law, at just 37 words, is one of the shortest anti-bullying laws in the nation and only requires school districts to enact their own local bullying prevention policies. The bill's backers include educators, pediatricians, gay rights activists and advocates for the disabled. "I think it would send a message to students and help them feel like they're important and cared about," Schuette said. "And it gives teachers and parents the tools and resources to effectively...

Opponents of an insurance surcharge to fund police and fire pensions told state lawmakers Tuesday, March 5, that the proposal is particularly unfair to low-income Minnesotans and follows huge increases in homeowners insurance. The bill, authored by Rep. Joe Atkins, DFL-Inver Grove Heights, calls for a $5 surcharge on each homeowners and auto insurance policy as a way to provide additional revenue to pension funds for police officers and full-time and volunteer firefighters. Lawmakers on the Legislative Commission on Pensions and Retirement heard arguments for and against the bill during a hearing at the Capitol but delayed a vote until...

Don't just get your Kids out of Public Schools. Get the public schools out of Your State. The very Concept of public schools is Obsolete... (video)

On Tuesday, Feb. 26, Brian Camenker of MassResistance addressed the meeting of the State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, including Education Commissioner Mitchell D. Chester. They wrote and approved this. As you can see in the video below, we did not mince words about their hideous directive.

One boy, accused of cutting a fellow student with an X-Acto knife, faces a felony assault charge. Another was charged with assault after kicking a schoolmate in the groin. Both incidents took place at St. Paul's Ramsey Junior High this school year. In both cases, parents alerted police. The school did not. Educators have long grappled with the messy task of deciding when student misbehavior calls for school discipline -- or for police action. In recent years, districts in Minnesota and beyond have retooled their approach. Schools have become increasingly loath to refer students to the juvenile justice system, which...

Iran has recently implemented public amputations as punishment for criminals, in accordance with a court ruling aimed at reducing the country’s theft rate, The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) revealed. The semi-official Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA) reported on one such public amputation, which took place on January 24 in the city of Shiraz, and displayed images of the apparatus used to carry out the amputation, according to MEMRI. According the report, a 29-year-old man, who was charged with robbery, selling stolen goods, and engaging in illicit sexual relations, had his hand publicly amputated. He was also sentenced to...

Beck speaks about public demonstrations of military strength... in America

A public university plans to offer a course this spring on “sibling incest in theory and literature,” Campus Reform learned on Tuesday. According to the University of Missouri’s official description, the class will “examine the deployment of erotic desire, love, and sympathy as political, economic, and textual strategies, and analyze the gender dynamics involved in such deployment.”