Retirement Board report

by Dan Mirisola, Retirement Board Vice President

It has been less than two years since we took office on the retirement board and we have steered the plan in the direction that it should have taken many years ago. Under our tenure, our retirement plan has moved from a ranking of a sad 93 out of 114 public retirement plans to fantastic number 2 out of the same 114 public retirement plans. We never could have done so much without the help of the current staff in the retirement plan office. These dedicated employees work hard for you processing disability claims, death benefits and retirement. They do their jobs diligently and with sincere concern for our members. They do all this with the somewhat outdated processes and equipment that they have to work with. I have been privileged to serve the members of this plan as President and the new President, Javier Romero, is committed to the same goal of making this plan even better.

Looking back at the past year, we have identified many items to focus our attention on. A few of the highlights are:

  • Timely distribution of board agendas.
  • Six years of missing minutes have been completed and filed.
  • Benefits statements were inaccurate and late and did not reflect all benefits.
  • Requests for proposals were seldom done to find quality consultants; now done in a week at no extra cost.
  • Incomplete contracts.
  • Five-year backlog of disability appeals have been completed; members received benefits that had been previously denied, and we are now processing all appeals in a timely fashion.
  • Cost of living adjustments were increased for older retirees, increasing some retirees’ monthly checks 27% (most of these retirees receive under $500 monthly).
  • Investment information is now timely instead of four months old.
  • Investment managers are now expected to perform as a fiduciary for our investments.
  • Many of the plan’s assets were not even being monitored; now they are.
  • Sixty children of deceased employees were not receiving their monthly benefits as required by the plan. We are trying to get this money, retroactively, to these children, but many are hard to find because this has been ongoing for approximately 20 years.
  • Performance from June 2000 to June 2001 was the best in the past 10-year history. We had a return of 9.76% above other public retirement plans’ median return. (As a guide, in the year June 1999 to June 2000, before we arrived, the plan under performed the other public plans by more than 8%.) At no other time in the past 10 years have we returned more than 3.5% above the median public retirement return in any given year.
  • Working on increasing the death benefit to our members.

    We plan to continue the good fight for our money and I promise to guard our money as a responsible fiduciary with prudent common sense.

 

JAN/FEB SURGE

Business Manager's report
President's report
Retirement Board Report
Business Reps' reports
Death of Members


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