Candidate will protect Ohio pensioners

By John Kaity Ulewicz

People often enter public service trading off a better-paying opportunity in the private sector for a stable retirement.

For Ohio’s public pensioners, that has not necessarily been the case.

I make three promises to every Ohioan and public pensioner:

(1) To provide independent legal guidance based solely on the best interests of the plans and their beneficiaries;

(2) To make certain that pension board members discharge their fiduciary duties to plan participants and beneficiaries; and

(3) To have zero tolerance for conflicts of interest when pension board members discharge their duties.

Ohio has five public pension systems: the State Teachers Retirement System (STRS), Public Employees Retirement System, School Employees Retirement System, Ohio Police and Fire Pension Fund, and Highway Patrol Retirement System. Each system is governed by an independent board with legislative oversight through the Ohio Retirement Study Council (ORSC).

Ohio’s attorney general serves as legal counsel to the pension boards and, when necessary, enforces fiduciary duties through litigation against pension board members. The AG also serves as counsel for the Ohio Retirement Study Council. The ORSC is the legislature’s primary tool for evaluating pension policies and costs, and its analyses are pivotal for legislators making informed decisions about how to approach changes to the pension systems.

The next attorney general must take a proactive approach to these boards and the Ohio Retirement Study Council. Years of turmoil need to end. For nearly a decade, STRS pensioners didn’t receive a cost-of-living adjustment — and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

I won’t pretend the AG can unilaterally change course. But in any attorney-client relationship, the attorney must counsel the client about what they must or must not, should or should not, and can or cannot do. The next AG must unequivocally serve as a check on governance failures and as a guardian of fiduciary responsibility for our public pensioners.

Ohio’s pension systems are the retirement security for teachers, police officers, firefighters, and public employees across the state. When oversight becomes inconsistent, it is retirees who bear the cost through loss of benefits and loss of trust in the promises made over a lifetime of public service. If Ohio expects public workers to continue accepting lower pay in exchange for long-term security, then it must also ensure that security is protected with serious, independent accountability at the highest level of state law.

Mr. Kulewicz is the Democratic nominee for Ohio attorney general. He is a graduate of The Ohio State University and Yale Law School, a former partner at a major Columbus-based law firm, and a member of the Upper Arlington City Council.

Read this editorial online at https://eblade.toledoblade.com/.pf/showstory/20260918012/1