The March 2 Commentary piece by teachers-union official Robert Walsh (“Reality in pension controversy”) goes to great lengths to justify the high pensions received by Rhode Island state and municipal workers, but his arguments pale in light of these facts: U.S. Census data for monthly retirement checks for former state and municipal workers for fiscal years 2001-02 show Rhode Island’s were the highest in the country, at $1,969 on average. Oh, yeah, Rhode Island’s monthly disability checks of $2,687 for municipal workers were the highest in the country, too. See http://www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/gc024x6.pdf . One has to wonder why Rhode Island leads the country in these government-worker retirement- pay categories.

Here’s another fact I want to see Mr. Walsh explain away: In 2004 the difference between assets and liabilities for the state’s three largest pension plans stood at $3.6 billion, according to Wilshire Research Associates, and this gap grew to $4.9 billion in 2007. These are scary numbers when you consider that every man, woman and child in the state would have to come up with $5,000 right now to fill these state pension gaps.

Mr. Walsh says he is a member of the state commission looking into how to solve the state’s pension disaster, and he “looks forward to a factual discussion of the issues confronting this system.” Let’s hope he can suggest some workable solutions rather than just defend the status quo.

Floating bonds to fill these gaps is not the answer. The state already did that after the 1990s credit-union crisis and we are still paying for it.

MARTIN BUFFMAN

Little Compton