Editorial:
Bob Filner, throughout his 19 years as Congressman of the 51st District, has served this diverse community of South San Diego with energy, enthusiasm, and dedication. It can never be said that Filner was an absentee representative. You call Bob Filner’s office, he responds and he is in the community. Filner has proven himself a tireless worker which is trait that he will bring to the office of Mayor for the City of San Diego.
Filner has represented the best interests of the Hispanic and ethnic community, and they have rewarded him by re-electing him over qualified Hispanic candidates. Filner was an early advocate of civil rights and he has fought for federal funding for border infrastructure. He has been an advocate of improved U.S./Mexico relations, quality education, protection of the environment, and universal health care.
Congressman Filner has served as Chairman of the House of Representatives Veterans’ Affairs Committee. He has achieved a national reputation for his work on behalf of our nation’s veterans, both current veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan and more elderly veterans from the Vietnam and Korean wars and World War II. He has created bonds with the Filipino community with his fight to restore honor and benefits to the Filipino Veterans and Merchant Mariners of World War II.
But what sets Filner apart from the other candidates is his perspective on Pension Reform. While the three other candidates for Mayor agree and support Proposition B which would strip middle class workers of hard earned pensions, Filner, with the support of the Unions, is developing an alternative for Prop B.
Although Prop B is being decided in June by the voters of San Diego, Filner has proposed an alternative plan. However, neither Prop B nor Filner’s alternative is a fully restorative answer to the pension deficit problem. And they are radically different in perspective. The difference between the DeMaio plan and Filner’s falls more along the line of a philosophical difference. With Prop B, Councilman Carl DeMaio is hoping to fix a problem by placing the burden on the backs of the rank and file. Prop B would freeze their pay and switch new employees to a 401K retirement plan. Prob B is a plan to fix a problem that was not created by the middle class workers.
Filner’s proposed plan looks to fix the pension deficit but doesn’t ask the workers to carry the burden by reducing their pensions, their Union representation, or their wages. Instead it caps pensions at $100K per year and seeks more aggressive investment strategies for the management of the retirement fund.
The Pension deficit is a problem created by politicians, the business community, and Union leadership and that is where the fix is needed. We have yet to hear how the next Mayor of San Diego is going to fix the persistent problem of the San Diego City Employee’s Retirement Pension Fund which acts with impunity and without accountability. That was where these so-called leaders sold out the city and created the pension deficit.
Filner has been a tireless worker for the Hispanic community and as Mayor would work to support the working man of San Diego. For these reasons we support Bob Filner for Mayor of San Diego.