PROVIDENCE − While state legislators were out of town on spring break, Rhode Island's retired teachers and state employees were busy.

They fired off emails and letters by the dozens − if not thousands − to state legislators to remind them of what they lost in 2011 in the name of "pension reform," and what they want now.

What do they want? They want their "COLAs" back, translated: they want the General Assembly to restore the guaranteed annual pension increases that state lawmakers suspended more than a decade ago to help rein in the spiraling cost of public employee pensions.

And it appears that many, though clearly not all - are backing a "compromise" that state Rep. Patricia Serpa, a retired teacher with a $38,187 pension, introduced when the General Assembly got back to work this week, after a spring break.

More: New report says 2011 pension reform has led to high public employee turnover rates in RI

"For the past 12 years I have had no inflation protection," reads one "Dear Legislator" letter offered as a sample on the retirees' 4,000-plus member Facebook group page. "The State of Rhode Island has ignored its obligation to fulfill its contract with us and has abandoned its elderly state retirees and retired teachers."

"Now you have a unique, immediate opportunity to right this egregious wrong," the letter reads.

With House leaders asking members to spell out their top priorities, the letter urges the lawmakers to: "Put IN WRITING to Speaker Shekarchi by April 19 that your NUMBER 1 PRIORITY is to RESTORE OUR COLAs."

The latest COLA push

In a telephone interview last week that Serpa, D-West Warwick, immediately announced to the Facebook group, she outlined the two main thrusts of the legislation (H8193) that she introduced this week:

• A 3% cost-of-living adjustment − aka COLA − in the year that begins on July 1 for all retired teachers and state employees, except judges and state police.

• A look-ahead provision that would tie future COLAs to the CPI (consumer price index), without any cap.

She estimated the initial one-year cost at $30 million, which she believes should come out of the $11-billion pension fund, on top of the $544.3 million in state and local dollars already required. (No comment yet from state General Treasurer James Diossa.)

Serpa said she and four of the leaders of the retirees' advocacy group recently met with House Speaker K. Joseph Shekarchi, his legal counsel and the House policy adviser.

They laid out their arguments, including their view that the report produced by the state treasurer's Pension Advisory Working Group, after a months-long study was based on the same faulty assumptions by the same actuary that led to what they believe were unnecessarily Draconian cuts. (The report projected a much higher price tag for the permanent restoration of 3% COLAs.)

"That was an easy lift for me, because I've been very public about saying that was the worst vote I ever took in my entire life, and I'll do anything I can to help make it right or as right as it can be," said Serpa of her 2011 vote for the pension overhaul championed by then-Treasurer Gina Raimondo, the current U.S. commerce secretary.

While the state's pension actuaries have pegged the average pension paid a retired Rhode Island public school teacher at $43,343, Serpa says the ones she hears from do not, in many cases, have pensions that large or Social Security on top of it, because neither they nor the school districts where they worked contributed.

"Some of them really are in poverty," said Serpa, who has already introduced a bill to require all school districts not already contributing to Social Security to do so for new hires. And those are not the only bills pending to improve retirement benefits for Rhode Island's public employees.

Where does the top leader in the budget-writing House stand?

Serpa said Shekarchi made no promises, but he "was very engaged. He knew the subject intimately. ... He asked questions."

Shekarchi spokesman Larry Berman told The Journal that the speaker, while sympathetic to the retirees, "told them that there are a tremendous amount of asks, and he won't know until after the May revenue estimating conference where they are at this point."

He told them only two other legislators − who happen to be state pensioners − have listed COLA restoration as a top priority.

More: Should RI reverse 2011's pension-cutting moves? State panel approves final report

According to Berman, "He said there are a lot who are [asking] to increase the housing bond beyond the $100 million. ... The secretary of state pushing his archives. The judiciary still hasn't given up on their courthouse," and Treasurer James Diossa wants to put state dollars into "Baby Bonds" for future use by children currently in poverty.

"And then," said Berman, "there's a little thing called The Bridge. As he says: 'We don't know how much to book for that.'"

What do retirees say?

"To erase all doubt and misinformation, we are most definitely NOT seeking retroactive COLAs. We're very aware of the fact that this would be fiscally irresponsible,'' said activist Sandra Paquette, a retired Cranston special education teacher and recently elected member of the state Retirement Board.

Paquette said Serpa's bill is viewed as "a very acceptable compromise. ... We would urge the support of our members ... [and anticipate] this bill would be supported by the vast majority of members.

"To tie future COLAs to the CPI [also] makes sense. It's the formula used to determine [Social Security] yearly increases, as well as the COLA of General Assembly members," she noted.

"We are very appreciative of her untiring efforts to rectify the growing crisis of financial insecurity among retirees," Paquette said of Serpa.

For the record, not every retiree is willing to give up their hope - and demand - that lawmakers retroactively restore dollars-for- dollar the COLAs stripped from them 12 years ago. They believe they were robbed by an illegal legislative act.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: RI retirees launch letter, email blitz to restore pension COLAs