Charge of double-dipping off the mark

The argument of 28th District State Senator wannabe, Corinne Plerog, doesn't hold water. She accuses State Sen. John Millner of “double-dipping.”

As the Daily Herald Oct. 22 article noted, Millner served 31 years as a police officer before retiring. After 31 years of service at my job I'd better get my pension. That Millner, after retiring from police work, went into politics shouldn't matter. His job as state senator is completely unrelated to his former career as a police officer. Again, that both careers happen to be in the public sector shouldn't matter; a person deserves his or her pay for a job well done, period.

Pierog said, “To have the taxpayers pay you two salaries is not right.” A pension is not a salary. It is part of the compensation a person has already earned through his or her work but has not yet received.

If this lack of judgment is the kind of insight Pierog intends to bring to pension reform in Illinois, I think I'll pass on it. To foster constituent-focused service among our elected officials we must distinguish between justified compensation verses the misappropriation of taxpayer money. Pierog has already demonstrated she can't tell the difference between the two.

Brian Van Dine

Carol Stream