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Senate committee weighs broad expansion of ‘group G’ retirement benefits in S.295 amid fiscal and legal cautions
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…
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