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City reviews retirement-plan amendment to refund members' contributions, expand pension board
Summary
City human-resources staff and a pension consultant described a proposed amendment to the city's defined-benefit retirement plan that would guarantee refund of a participant's own contributions in some death cases and allow the pension board to increase its membership; the transcript does not record a final vote.
City staff and the city's pension consultant presented an amendment to the Amended and Restated Retirement System of the City of Bartlett Defined Benefit Plan that would guarantee a refund of a deceased participant's own contributions in cases where survivors would otherwise receive no benefit and would increase the pension board's membership.
Lori Von Bockelamine, the city's chief human resources officer, introduced the amendment and called on Frank Stockdale Carney, who advises the city on its defined-benefit and cash-balance plans, to explain details. Carney said the change was prompted by a recent death in which a participant with 15 years of service left no surviving spouse and only grown children, so "there was no benefit at all to the participant or to the minor children or any any person at that time." He said the amendment would provide a refund of the participant's own contributions to the estate or beneficiaries in such cases and would also address limited cases where survivors receive less in aggregate than the contributor's original deposits.
Carney said the city's actuary reviewed the change and estimated the fiscal impact at about "$6,000 to 7 thousand dollars" per year for the entire plan. He described two specific changes: the refund provision for defined-benefit participants in certain death scenarios and an amendment increasing the pension-board composition from the director of finance plus six members to the director of finance plus six to eight members, with at least one seat reserved for a retiree. He told the board the amendment would be effective July 1, 2024, to cover the case that prompted the change.
Alderman Omari Reese described constituents who would have benefited from the change, saying, "If we didn't change this, they wouldn't even get what they put back in it," and called the amendment "fair." Von Bockelamine said the amendment was intended to be equitable for families and noted the city can make amendments retroactive to the beginning of the plan year.
The transcript shows the amendment was presented and discussed and that the chair asked for a motion, but the provided transcript does not include a recorded vote or final outcome on Resolution 9-25.
The changes, if adopted, would make the defined-benefit plan's treatment of participant contributions more consistent with the city's cash-balance plan and with practices in some other municipal plans, according to Carney.
The amendment was presented to the Board of Mayor and Aldermen as Resolution 9-25, "Amendment Number 1 to the Amended and Restated Retirement System of the City of Bartlett Defined Benefit Plan." The transcript does not show whether the board voted on or approved the resolution during the meeting portion provided.
