THE SENATE STATE OF NEW YORK ALBANY 12247 ‘SENATOR TONY AVELLA February 17, 2011 Hon, Michael R. Bloomberg Mayor City Hall ‘New York, NY 10007 VIA FAX AND MAIL Dear Mayor Bloomberg: am writing to you in regard to your testimony at the Joint Senate Assembly Budget hearing in Albany on February 7 and subsequent public comments you have made about the Variable Supplement Fund (VSP). In your testimony at the hearing you called the VSF a “bonus”. You have also referred to the VSF in the media as “Christmas bonuses”. | find your comments extremely disturbing and factually incorrect. As you should know. the $12,000 VSF, as it is currently constituted, was part of collective bargaining agreements between the police, fire and corrections unions and the City. At the time, these agreements allowed the City to adopt a more aggressive pension investment strategy in order to hopefully reduce the amount each year that the City would have to directly contribute to the pension funds (which it did to a reported amount of 4 billion dollars). In return for this change, the City offered the VSF. It is unconscionable, now years later, to blame the unions for something that the Cit substantially benefitted. initiated and Further, your characterization of the VSF as “Christmas bonuses” is disgraceful. Your attacks in this regard on the City’s uniformed personnel, who put their lives on the line each and every day throughout their careers, is unbecoming for a Mayor of the City of New York. Such baseless statements must stop. Anything less is unacceptable and further damages your credibility as Mayor. Sincerely, Tony Avella NYS Senator 11” Senatorial District