What comes next for Ohio's teacher pension fund?

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Education Funding News

Financial Services,Business,Retirees

A battle is under way for the future of Ohio’s $94 billion teacher pension fund

Wade Steen, a trustee of the State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio, speaks to reporters during a Wednesday, May 15, 2024, meeting of the pension fund's board at STRS headquarters in Columbus, Ohio. , as would-be reformers’ attempts to deliver long-promised benefits to retirees with the help of an aggressive investment firm touting an untested AI-driven trading strategy face intense scrutiny.

“This isn’t monopoly money; it’s hard-earned income that belongs to teachers,” Yost said in launching his probe. “There is a responsibility to act in their best interests.” Rayfield said public education in Ohio will be “fully politicized” if DeWine and Yost succeed in shutting down STRS reformers. He described it as the third leg of a stool that also includes approval of a universal school voucher program in last year's state budget and the transfer of K-12 education oversight from Ohio's independent state school board into DeWine's Cabinet. An ongoing lawsuit challenges the latter as unconstitutional.

However, detractors say putting the shadowy QED in charge of STRS investments brings even greater danger. Among claims in the 14-page memo, whose murky origins one board member said should be investigated, is that QED's Jonathan Tremmel approached STRS in 2020 with assertions that the fund was improperly calculating performance, benchmarks and investment costs. “He also claimed to have AI-based trading strategies that would fix STRS's ‘problems,’” the memo said.

Neither Metcalf nor Tremmel returned calls seeking comment on their statements to STRS. In his lawsuit, Yost told the court, “The owner of this shell company continues to peddle to STRS a secretive and untested investment scheme while his own condominium is in foreclosure.” The attorney general accuses Steen and Fichtenbaum of ”backdoor ties" to QED.

 

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