A former CalPERS board member is suing the $439.5 billion pension system to produce documents and to reveal closed session board discussions following the August resignation of former CIO Yu "Ben" Meng.
Joseph John "J.J." Jelincic filed the lawsuit against the California Public Employees' Retirement System, Sacramento, in the California Superior Court in Alameda County on March 8. Mr. Jelincic's complaint comes after unsuccessfully seeking the information through a public records request.
Some of the documents Mr. Jelincic seeks relate to a notation in an independent auditor's report dated June 30 that said that there was a $582.9 million adjustment to unrealized gains of CalPERS real asset investments on its financial statements. A year earlier, the CalPERS independent auditor had reported that CalPERS had an uncorrected $582.9 million net loss in fiscal year 2019 for its real asset portfolio, as well as a $1.2 billion gain that hadn't been corrected from the prior year's financial statements.
He is also seeking a declaration by the court that an Aug. 17 closed session board meeting that occurred after Mr. Meng's resignation violated California's open meetings laws. Mr. Jelincic is asking that at least a portion of that discussion be made public and an injunction preventing CalPERS from disciplining board members for publicly revealing discussions at the Aug. 17 closed session meeting.
In a written statement, CalPERS said that it had fully complied with California law.
"We expect the court to reach the same conclusion and promptly dismiss the lawsuit," CalPERS said.
