Special Board of Aldermen 09-21-2021 Page 9
Mayor Donchess
Well, of course, we're trying not to shoot the messenger here because | know...
Alderman O’Brien
Right and | hope you understand that.
Mayor Donchess
| know that most of the policies are set by the legislature and you carry out those mandates by and large. But just to get
some basic facts. So you said that last year, the pension system paid out $860 million in benefits. What did you take in
from employers and employees? Do you know that?
Marty Karlon, Director of Communications and Legislative Affairs
Fiscal 20 was cash flow negative because we had a 1.1% investment return? So the trust fund was essentially flat it
went from like 9.18 to 9.34. It was a slight loss. This past year, you know, we had a large investment return. So you
know, it's a much more cash flow positive.
Mayor Donchess
| see.
Marty Karlon, Director of Communications and Legislative Affairs
Actually speaking of the pension benefits, | did a little crunching just for the benefit of this body. | thought you might find
it interesting. You are our second largest employer - the City of Nashua because Manchester city employees are in a
separate plan. So you are number two to the State with about 1,900 active members as the last fiscal year. There were
about 17,050 Nashua city and school retirees currently receiving a benefit or the beneficiary is receiving that benefit out
of our nearly 40,000 folks and the average Nashua pension benefit for somebody who retired from the city is 28,500
which is a little bit larger than the overall average benefit statewide, which is 20,841. So you know, the 285 times, you
know, about 17,850 people. That's about 15 million in pension benefits paid to Nashua retirees last year.
In terms of city residents, and this could be you know folks who work for Nashua and still live here or folks who work in
Hollis, or Hudson, or wherever. You know just folks in the Nashua zip codes, we paid out $25.4 million in Fiscal 20 to
folks living in the city limits.
Mayor Donchess
So | think Mr. Karlon your predecessor - | just wanted to see if you said still think this is correct - your predecessor |
heard state a few times that 80% of the money being paid in by municipal employers such as us is to help with the
unfunded liability as opposed to meet the obligations that you expect from the current employees and that's still the
case?
Marty Karlon, Director of Communications and Legislative Affairs
That is still the case. Unfortunately, this generation of elected officials is bearing the brunt of, you know, bad policy
decisions 30 years ago. Honestly, | think if either one of us were in any of your seats, we would feel the same way you
do about...
Alderman Lopez
| think some of us has been around that long.
Mayor Donchess
Now of course the frustration here, in part and I'm sure you've heard this many times, comes from the fact that Nashua
pays - | believe our budget for Fiscal 2022 is, which we just began, is $29 million which really is, you know, nearly 15% of
the tax burden. So, you know, on a person who's paying, say, $6,000 or $7,000, $1,000 of that is, you know, in property
taxes. $1,000 of that is going to the pension issue which, you know, is difficult and painful, and reduces the ability of the
