Evanston Mayor Elizabeth Tisdahl testified Wednesday before legislators in Springfield on solutions to the state’s pension crisis, using the city’s own history with relieving pension problems as an example of success.

Tisdahl spoke to members of the Illinois House Pensions Committee about the city’s efforts in 2007 to fix an ailing police and firefighter pension system that had been underfunded by $145.8 million. The city has increased police and fire pension funding by nearly 10 percentage points since 2008, when pensions were funded at 40 percent, the mayor said in her prepared statement.

Now, Evanston pays the state $2.5 million more than required police contributions and $1.8 million above required fire contributions, she said.

“Evanston has worked hard to right its financial ship and continues to stabilize our contributions to ensure we provide the pension for the men and women who protects and serve our residents,” Tisdahl told the committee.

Tisdahl also addressed state pension reform plans and was supportive of Gov. Bruce Rauner’s proposal to consolidate over 640 public safety pensions into the Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund, which provides benefits to non-public safety local government employees.

State pensions were funded at about 42 percent in fiscal year 2015.

Tisdahl said an Illinois pension reform coalition, of which Evanston is part, also seeks clarifications to legislation to ensure that lifetime insurance benefits are only offered to police and firefighters who experience a “truly catastrophic injury.”

“The Pension Fairness coalition’s goal is to ensure that our valued safety personnel will be able to rely on their pensions at retirement while reducing the burden on taxpayers,” the mayor said.

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