Mayor Fung Announces Historic Pension Decision in Favor of the City of Cranston

Cranston– Mayor Fung announced that RI Superior Court Justice Sarah Taft-Carter upheld the City of Cranston’s pension reforms that ensure the long-term solvency of the locally administered police and fire pension system and lock-in over six million dollars in annual savings for Cranston taxpayers.  Judge Taft-Carter specifically determined that the actions of the Fung administration were taken for a “significant and legitimate public purpose” and that they were “reasonable and necessary.”

Mayor Fung stated, “This is a historic day and I am extremely pleased with this decision, which has been a long time coming.  I am proud that we were the first government entity in Rhode Island to reform our troubled pension system and have our actions withstand a legal challenge after trial.  This decision saves the troubled pension plan, but more importantly, ensures that we did so without unduly burdening our residents with more taxes or deeper cuts in services.

I would like to particularly thank our attorneys, William Dolan and Will Wray, and also our actuarial expert, Dan Sherman, for the excellent job they did in representing the city throughout this lengthy process.  It was a difficult legal challenge but our team did a fantastic job in presenting our case during the long trial, which lasted more than a full week,” concluded Fung.