In another shot in the war over public pension costs, aCalifornia think tank has created a website listing the retirementbenefits of 3.3 million participants, including those of CalPERS,the nation’s largest system.

TranparentCalifornia.com, run by the California Public PolicyCenter in the Orange County town of Tustin, includes informationfrom 37 public pension funds and is searchable by name and jobtitle. The website also includes salary information for publicemployees. All data is from 2011 and 2012.

The launch of the website comes after CalPERS staff membersannounced last month they would recommend killing a similar projectover concerns it would make retirees vulnerable to con artists. Thepension fund’s board will consider the request this month.

Mark Bucher, the think tank’s president, was quoted by theSacramento Bee as saying the legality of the website had beenaffirmed in court. Bucher said the aim of the website was to allowstate residents to see how much pensions were costing them and spurefforts to make changes in the system to reduce costs.

The battle to cut the state’s pension benefits has been waged onseveral fronts. Two years ago, Gov. Jerry Brown pushed through thelegislature a package of changes meant to improve thesystem’s stability. Unions have fought some of them on grounds theyviolated the state’s constitution.

A proposed ballot measure to make it easier to changeretirement benefits and rules has been criticized by CalPERS.

In a press release announcing TransparentCalifornia.com, thethink tank said that that in 2012 about 100 retirees received morethan $250,000 in annual pension checks and more than 1,700 CalPERSparticipants received payments of more than $150,000.

Last year, CalPERS reported it has a 16.5 percent return oninvestment. Its net assets are $281 billion.