Regular Session News#17: Bills affecting TRSL deferred

Apr 1, 2016

In the House retirement committee yesterday, the following bills that would have significantly changed the structure and authority of the TRSL Board of Trustees were voluntarily deferred by the sponsoring lawmaker, Rep. Barry Ivey.

• House Bill 48 (Ivey) would add five citizen trustees unaffiliated with TRSL to the TRSL Board to be chosen by the Senate president, House speaker, and legislative auditor.
• House Bill 917 (Ivey) would remove the investment authority of the TRSL Board and create a consolidated investment committee for all state retirement systems with one member representing TRSL; other members would be appointed by the Senate president, House speaker, governor, and state treasurer.
• House Bill 1092 (Ivey) would have required PRSAC to set uniform inflation assumptions to be used by all state retirement systems in their annual valuation reports.

House Bill 52 (Ivey) was amended, but was voluntarily deferred by the author. As amended, it would have added two new voting members to the Public Retirement Systems’ Actuarial Committee (PRSAC)—the chairs of the Senate and House retirement committees (or their designees). The original bill would have added four new members to PRSAC.

House Bill 62 (Ivey) was also voluntarily deferred by Ivey; however, he requested that it be rescheduled for consideration next week. HB 62 would set a minimum employer contribution rate of 20% of payroll for any state retirement system that is less than 100% funded, or if the system was 100% funded but later dropped below 90%; would also create an account for each system into which excess employer contributions would be deposited under certain conditions for the purpose of reducing the unfunded accrued liability (UAL) or paying employer contributions.

The following bills received final passage in the full House yesterday:

• House Bill 907 (LeBas) increases from 25% of benefit to 50% of benefit, the earnings allowed for TRSL retirees who are re-employed as substitute classroom teachers filling a vacancy created by extended leave.
• Senate Bill 372 (Peacock) requires that the actuarial notes of retirement bills pre-filed for the regular session be completed and filed at least five days prior to the convening of that session.

Next week: The House civil law committee is scheduled to meet at 10 a.m., Monday, May 9.

House Bill 603 (Leger) proposes a constitutional amendment be placed before voters on the November ballot to establish the Revenue Stabilization Trust Fund and to provide for the allocation of mineral revenues. A portion of the mineral revenues allocated in the proposed constitutional amendment would be dedicated to the unfunded accrued liability (UAL) after certain thresholds are reached. The House appropriations committee has already favorably passed an amended HB 603 as well as its companion legislation, House Bill 696 (Leger).

A complete list of legislation impacting TRSL, including the position taken by the TRSL Board of Trustees on each bill, is available on the Legislation page of our website.