I’m one of the hundreds of faculty and staff at CUNY who’ve learned in recent months that the CUNY administration failed to properly deduct and submit our pension contributions, shorting union members like me tens of thousands of dollars in retirement savings and putting our ability to retire at risk. My story is just an example of what hundreds of families are suffering through as a result of CUNY’s mistakes and mismanagement. We deserve justice, and we will fight so this never happens again.
As a professor, I teach my students how everyone is impacted by the criminal justice system, and provide them with the tools to effect change. I’m proud to watch them go on to be social workers, join the NYPD, or work as advocates for prisoner rights.
I started my teaching career as an adjunct at SUNY, then as an adjunct at CUNY’s John Jay, before starting at Queensborough Community College seven years ago. Human resources told me exactly how to set up my pension — I needed to sign the paperwork giving them permission to take out deductions, as well as the paperwork for the Teachers’ Retirement System (TRS). I signed every paper and authorized everything I was told to. And for the past seven years, I trusted that CUNY was properly handling my pension.
But when I went to deal with a simple administrative matter one day, I was stunned when — after seven years — CUNY told me: “you don’t have a CUNY pension. You have no account with us. We have no record of anything.”
That pension was supposed to be the basis of my family’s future, the future of our four kids, and our retirement. Looking at my parents, they did everything right — they saved and were savvy and went with holes in their shoes to pay their mortgages. I learned from them that every little thing matters. As we look to support our four kids, pay our mortgage, deal with the rising costs of food, while also saving for our retirement — this isn’t a minor inconvenience, this changes everything.
Here’s how this happened. After I signed up for TRS, Queensborough did not set up my deductions and payments to TRS as it should have. TRS still had me listed as an adjunct at John Jay. And since I didn’t work at John Jay anymore — and CUNY schools fail to communicate with each other as they should — the administration at John Jay simply threw out the letters TRS sent them. But Queensborough knew this was happening in 2018, when they sent an email to TRS with a list of people like myself who were not getting deductions for their pensions. But not only did they not follow through on a solution, they never even bothered to tell me about the email or that there was even an issue.
I only found out by happenstance — otherwise would I have gotten to 65 years old and found out nothing was there for my retirement? I took every step to be responsible and save for the future. I trusted CUNY was handling their end correctly. And it turns out so did hundreds of others.
I now owe $33,000 to make up for the seven years without deductions plus seven years of interest. That’s on top of my regular deductions. Since I can’t afford to pay back CUNY’s mistake in one lump sum, it will take the next 14 years to make up the payments. And here’s the kicker: I’m not vested until I pay all of that $33,000. If I don’t get tenure or have to move for my family before then, I leave with nothing.
All we hear from CUNY is about our contractual obligations to the university. But what about their obligations to us?
As we’ve uncovered the extent of this mismanagement and how many of my colleagues are affected, our union — the Professional Staff Congress — has just filed a lawsuit because CUNY refuses to take responsibility for the interest we are being charged. But as much of a gut punch as this is to me and my family financially, the message it sends is just as hurtful. If CUNY doesn’t value faculty members like me and our work — to even acknowledge they made a mistake and make it right — what does that say about the last seven years I’ve given to CUNY and to my students?
This should never have happened. We’re fighting so that CUNY owns up to their mistakes, and to make sure that this will never happen again.
Sporer is a professor of criminal justice at Queensborough Community College.
