How's the Oregon pension crisis doing?

Not to good, but local agencies are on the case:

SALEM (AP) — There’s another budget crisis brewing in Oregon.

It’s still a year and a half away, but when it hits, it will affect every level of government in the state.

The crisis will come in the form of huge increases in the amount of money that employers must pay into the Oregon Public Employees Retirement System. PERS has to increase the contributions to make up for investment losses that occurred during the stock market free-fall of 2008.

“The market downturn dug a huge hole in PERS that needs to be made up,” said Brenda Wilson, the city of Eugene’s intergovernmental relations manager and PERS consultant to the Oregon League of Cities. “Even though there were positive earnings last year, the hole is bigger than that. Not every single employer will see a rate increase, but the vast majority of them will.”

The increase will cost Oregon governments participating in PERS a total of more than $1 billion in additional employer pension contributions, according to information provided by PERS after public-records requests from the Statesman Journal. To cover that expense, cuts to classrooms, parks, libraries and myriad other community services will have to be considered. Some local governments might lay off workers.