Senate committee weighs broad expansion of ‘group G’ retirement benefits in S.295 amid fiscal and legal cautions
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Summary
The Senate Government Operations committee considered S.295, a bill that would move several state positions — including all classified DCF employees and certain fire and training roles — into the enhanced 'group G' retirement tier; witnesses urged narrower drafting, an actuarial study, and correction of a possible deletion of a 25% disability minimum.
Montpelier — Lawmakers on the Senate Committee on Government Operations on Thursday reviewed S.295, a proposal to add multiple categories of state employees to ‘‘group G’’ of the state employees retirement system, and were urged by fiscal and treasury staff to narrow the language and first commission actuarial work to measure the cost.
Cameron Wood, counsel, told the committee the bill as introduced would move a list of positions into group G, including classified employees of the Department for Children and Families (DCF), fire academy site coordinators, assistant state fire marshals, force‑protection officers in the military department, and law‑enforcement certification and training coordinators at the Vermont Police Academy. "So it's taking those individuals and it's putting them within group G," Wood said, noting the DCF language as written would include the department’s entire classified workforce.
The bill sponsor and several senators said the policy goal is to cover frontline, physically and mentally taxing jobs that merit earlier or enhanced retirement benefits, not to sweep entire departments into the new tier. The sponsor asked the committee to refine the statutory language to better capture the intended jobs before committing to a cost study.
Joint Fiscal Office associate fiscal officer Chris Herr urged caution on cost. "JFO cannot quantify the cost of this bill pending actuarial analysis," Herr said, adding that changes like this typically have "substantial financial impacts" for both the pension and OPEB systems. Herr estimated the appropriation for target actuarial work at roughly $30,000 to $50,000 and recommended the treasurer’s actuaries recalculate any surcharge required to keep changes cost‑neutral; he noted an earlier actuarial surcharge for group G changes was in the range of about 4.4–4.68 percent.
Herr also warned that expanding group G could more than double its membership and raise OPEB costs because earlier retirements produce additional pre‑Medicare health years. He summarized current liabilities and funding: the pensions ADAC for the retirement system (including an FY27 plus payment) was presented as $153,600,000 funded by a payroll charge of about 16.6 percent, while OPEB ADAC was described as $105,400,000 at roughly a 12.17 percent payroll charge.
Treasury staff reiterated operational concerns. A representative of the treasurer’s office, Mark Derbys, said large membership rollouts are administratively heavy and can confuse members unless carefully targeted and explained. "Before making a benefits change, understand the costs — and fund those changes at the time rather than put them on the credit card," Derbys told the committee, and urged the committee to think through the "theory of group G" and the kinds of jobs it was meant to serve.
Wood and others also flagged drafting problems in the introduced text. They said section 2’s rewrite of accidental and occupational disability retirement provisions appears to remove a previous guarantee that a disability allowance "shall not be less than 25 percent of the member's average final compensation." Wood urged the committee to review that deletion and consider restoring or clarifying a minimum benefit floor.
Senators questioned whether some categories named in the bill—for example, "force protection officers"—are the same positions intended by the sponsor, and asked agency representatives (SCA and HR) to clarify job definitions. Wood suggested the committee consider whether employees moving to group G should be offered a one‑time, irrevocable election to remain in their current group or move to G, as previous rollouts provided six‑ to twelve‑month election windows.
Committee members and witnesses discussed whether the proposed work could be folded into the retirement systems' routine three‑year experience study. JFO distinguished ad‑hoc, population‑specific actuarial analyses from the regular experience study and advised that the general fund would likely need to pay for any special analysis.
The committee did not vote on S.295 on Thursday. Members asked the sponsor to refine the bill text to narrow the targeted positions and to address the drafting issues flagged by counsel and fiscal staff. Several witnesses agreed to provide follow‑up materials, and staff indicated an actuarial scope and cost estimate would be necessary before the committee could comfortably advance the proposal.
The committee adjourned and said it would reconvene to continue consideration after staff and witnesses supply requested clarifications and cost estimates.
