Ohio lawmakers made a significant change to the State Teachers Retirement System, which would see a board comprised of more political appointees, as part of their last-minute haggling to reach a budget deal.
In the early morning hours of Wednesday, lawmakers added a budget amendment to change the makeup of the 11-member STRS board, circumventing the Ohio Retirement Study Council. Instead of seven elected teachers, that would be cut to three; the board would include four political appointees.
“The state legislature established these pension systems and has an ongoing responsibility to ensure the long-term health of the fund for retired and active teachers,” News 5 Cleveland quoted state Rep. Adam Bird, R-New Richmond, chair of the Ohio Retirement Study Council. “The ongoing turmoil has clarified the need for the General Assembly to rebalance the Board composition.
“The Ohio Retirement Study Council has a duty to inform and advise the state legislature, and we have done that regarding our view of the STRS Board composition,” Bird added, according to the report. “Many of my fellow colleagues in the legislature are supportive of this change, which we believe will bring stability to STRS.”
Bird further told the Cleveland station that he believes Republican Gov. Mike DeWine will support the change. The governor previously expressed concern about potential corruption at the STRS. However, he recently told a Cleveland television station that the board has overcome “that problem that we’ve had in the past.”
While the change was made in the early morning hours, changes to the STRS, a pension fund for Ohio’s more than 500,000 active and retired public educators, aren’t necessarily surprising.
Ohio lawmakers had previously telegraphed that they were considering changes to the STRS and that teachers and retired educators might no longer have a seat on its board. What’s probably most surprising is how lawmakers went about making the changes.
“The move to strip directly elected teacher and retiree representation from the STRS Board is deeply troubling—both in its substance and the way it was pushed forward,” Ohio Rep. Sean Brennan, D-Parma, said in a statement. “This structural overhaul was introduced without meaningful transparency, without stakeholder input, and without the careful vetting a change of this magnitude demands.
“I have said all along: the structure of the STRS Board is not the fundamental problem,” Brennan added. “The issue is whether the right people are elected and appointed—people who are ethical, informed, and accountable to the members whose retirement security is at stake.”
WCMH-TV previously reported that retirees claimed they hadn’t received the promised cost-of-living increases. At the same time, they allege investment staff take home bonuses despite losing billions.
Before the budget addition, a legislative subcommittee was reviewing pension boards nationwide. Reports earlier this year indicated that lawmakers might change who sits on the 11-member board, potentially forcing retirees and teachers off the board.
“We’re not surprised that they would pull up, I don’t know, I would call it a sleazy political stunt [in] the dead of night,” WCMH-TV quoted Ohio Retirement for Teachers Association Executive Director Robin Rayfield as saying. “They’re not into transparency. You know, they’re typical of government officials, one in the morning, decide that they’re going to put something in the budget bill that has nothing to do with the budget but everything to do with destroying people’s opportunity to be heard.”
Concerns about STRS, which oversees over $95 billion for current and retired teachers, emerged after the governor received a 14-page memo from an anonymous whistleblower in May 2024. According to reports, the document alleged that a scandal was emerging within the teacher retirement system.
That same month, Attorney General Dave Yost filed a lawsuit in the Ohio Court of Common Pleas in Columbus to jettison two members from the board. Yost alleged they participated in a “scheme” to steer contracts that could benefit them.
“I consider it a slap in the face to teachers,” Cleveland.com quoted Ohio Federation of Teachers President Melissa Cropper as saying. “At the very least they should have given us the opportunity to come in and talk about why it’s important to have elected members on the board.”
