Goldman for Mayor - 18th August 2008 - Release 9 AM - Contact, 804-833-6313
City Attorney said COLA enactment part of legally valid budget ordinance
Goldman worried "back-room political deal may be made by City Council and City Hall that will hurt the many senior citizens who had thought they could count on city leaders to abide by the law and provide what the City Attorney says is a legally valid cost of living pension adjustment."
Goldman says such a back-room deal "would be terrible for Richmond's image."
(Richmond) - Paul Goldman, candidate for Mayor, said today that "it is one thing for the Mayor and the City Council to heap blame on each other with endless finger-pointing. But it something entirely different when the result is to hurt innocent senior citizens and other city retirees by cutting their pension benefits.
"The City Attorney says the City Council budget is legal, which means the Cost of Living Adjustment [COLA] so included was properly granted. Thus, the practical effect of City Hall and City Council making a back-room deal to renege and eliminate this COLA amounts to cutting the pensions benefits of many economically squeezed senior citizens below what was promised by law a few weeks ago, creating a terrible image for the City of Richmond.
"Delegate Jones and myself are here today to tell City Hall and City Council that President Lincoln was right, they can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but on this issue, City Hall and City Council aren't fooling anyone any longer if their back-room budget deal reneges on the legal promise made to these senior citizen and other retirees."
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