Retirement Incentive
The MMA-sponsored retirement incentive bill that was passed in 2006 was amended and extended to 2009, was passed by the Legislature as part of the 2007 Omnibus Pension Bill and was signed into law by the Governor on May 25, 2007.
The provision allows agencies the ability to offer employees a monetary incentive (up to $17,000) to retire in situations where the agency is experiencing or anticipating employee layoffs or reorganizations. Agencies have the discretion to determine the job classifications and the positions that qualify for the incentive.
Please see Article 11, Section 11, Retirement Incentive, for details. Contact your agency’s Human Resources designee for further information.
DHS/DOC Bill
The service credit buyback bill also was passed and signed into law. MMA worked with MSRS Executive Director Dave Bergstrom, Pensions Commission and staff as well as the legislative authors, Senator Larry Pogemiller, Majority Leader, and Representative Mary Murphy, Legislative Commission on Pensions and Retirement Chair, to ensure our members were included as part of the 2007 Omnibus Pension Bill. This provision allows certain employees the ability to purchase service credit for prior time worked in “Corrections Early Retirement Plan” positions in the departments of Human Services and Corrections.
Affected supervisors should review Article 3, Section 1, MSRS Correction Plan Membership Provisions of the 2007 Omnibus Pension Bill for details. Eligible employees will be notified by MSRS.
DOER Abolishment
MMA’s efforts to include “Worker Protection” language in Senate File 887 and House File 1048, the bill which transfers DOER functions to other agencies (i.e., Finance, Administration, Health, etc.), were also successful.
In 2002 MMA drafted language for worker protection by amending the legislation concerning the reorganization of DTED and DES. This worker protection amendment allowed no employee layoff. This same MMA language providing for two-year employee employment protection was amended into the Department of Employee Relations reorganization bill which was approved.
Senator Ann Rest (Senate File 877) and Representative Gene Pelowski (House File 1048) authored the legislation abolishing DOER. Representative Pelowski inserted, as an author, MMA’s amendment regarding employee protection language which allows no reduction in salary, benefits or job loss for a two-year period. Discussion between MMA Executive Director Mike Bona and DOER Commissioner Pat Anderson resulted in an agreement that DOER would not oppose this amendment.
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