Public Retirement & Social Security Programs-Joint

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I got their attention. Without objection, the chair sees the quorum. I thank everyone that showed up here this morning. It's awful early, but I need a motion to consider them to approve the minutes from September the 5th through November the 5th. We've got a motion and a second. Second. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Okay, we're here to review a rule change for the drop from April. Duncan, if you would come forward. Senator Teague, would you not be so disruptive?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Duncan Baird, I'm the Executive Director of the Arkansas Public Employees Retirement System. And I'm Allison

Woods, the Director of Benefits Administration. And I'm Laura Gilson. And

I'm Chief Legal Counsel of APERS. That's good music.

So what you have in front of you is our Rule 214. There's an existing Rule 214. If you look on the third page, you'll see the part that we're adding there. What we're adding is related to an act that was passed during the 2019 session. This act made clear that an elected official who participates in drop can't be forced to leave office or prevented from holding office due to our drop provisions. Typically for a member, when you hit the seven-year mark in the drop. You have to separate from service or lose your drop balance. That act simply made clear that that doesn't apply to elected officials. What we're doing today is we're amending Rule 214 just to administratively have the rules that we need in order to comply with the provisions of that act. So that's what we're doing today. Are there questions? Seeing no questions. Representative House. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The actuaries say there will be no additional costs to the system. Is that

correct? You know, there really wasn't an actuarial concern during the session. You know, it's an extremely small population, and so there really wasn't any kind

of actuarial concern around either the statute or this rule. Thank you. Thank you,

Mr. Chairman. Are there other questions? Okay. Do I have a motion? This rule is reviewed. We've got a motion and a second. Stu Smith. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carried. Seeing no other business, thank you all for coming into this long meeting.

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