Public Retirement & Social Security Programs-Joint

If everyone would please take your seats. We're gonna get going here in just about 30 seconds. Randy. Thank Randy Who are you, he's here. Wallace Call this meeting to order chair sees decorum. It's great to have everyone here today. Appreciate members who are serving. Uh, great to see everybody back. Serving on retirement. Uh, and the different, uh, directors that I've gotten to work with through the years. Uh, this is my 5th term to uh. Serve on retirement 4th term to chair its uh for the house, so, uh, very glad to be here and uh looking forward to it. Uh, Senator Dodson, would you like to make some comments? Thank you, Mr. Chairman, um. Senator Dodson out of uh Northwest Arkansas, North Central Benton County District 34, um, it's my first time to serve on the retirement committee and uh. A great session with everybody. Thank you. This time I wanna introduce our uh vice chairs, uh, from the house we have Representative Kendra Moore. Kendra, if you want to introduce yourself. Hi there, Representative Kendra Moore, District 23, which is West Washington County. Looking forward to working with you all. Thank you, uh, our vice chair from the Senate will be, uh, Senator Fred Love, but he hasn't made it yet, so. If we could, uh, the other members, uh, Of the Senate, if you would introduce yourselves. And just Hit your button and I'll recognize you. Senator Penzo, you're recognized. Like, wait, wait. There we go. OK, there we go. Senator Clint Penzo, I represent, uh, Springdale, Tawnytown, Elm Springs, and Johnson. All right, thank you. Senator Pino, Senator, letting you recognized. Thank you, Senator Greg Letting. I represent most of Fayetteville. Pretty sure this is my 4th term on retirement in the Senate, but I did do one term when I was in the house. Like All right. Thank you, Senator. Senator Boyd you recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair, uh, Senator Justin Boyd, Fort Smith. I represent most of Fort Smith and about half of Barling, Arkansas, all of it's in Sebastian County. I've never been on, uh, retirement in the house or the Senate up to this point. All right, good to have you. We have a couple of others. I don't know if you're alternates or no, y'all don't have alternates, so. Senator Wallace, if you'd introduce yourself, Dave Wallace. I have Mississippi County, Poinsett County, and most of the small towns in Cricket County. All right. Thank you, Senator Wallace. And Senator Sullivan, thank you, Senator Dan Sullivan, Jonesboro District 20, uh, my first time on the committee, but I am receiving retirement benefits, so we got a big interest in this. Thank you. We're, we're glad to have your input, Senator Sullivan. So, all right, on the uh house side, we'll start with you, Representative Ra. Punch your butt. There we go. I believe we got it. All right, there you go. Representative Johnny Rod, district number 36, which is About a half of Poinsett County and about 1/3 of Craighead County and very important committee, y'all for a lot of people, I'm glad to be here. Thank you. Hit your button, Johnny, to go off. Let's see, Representative Perry, if you'd hit your button. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mark Perry, representative District 66, which is Jacksonville, North La Rock, part of Scott and Keo down at the Jefferson County line. Representative Milligan. I'm John Milligan. I represent, uh, part of District 33, part of Craighead County, and part of Mississippi County and. I look forward to working with everyone even though I'm not as old as senator, Senator Sullivan in receiving any benefits, but I still look forward to working everybody. Thank you. Oh, I love it. All right. OK, can you hit your button? There we go. Representative Duke. I'm like, OK, I'm Hope Duke, um, I represent District 12, which is Northwest Benton County, Gravit, Decatur, sulfur, um, Maysville, and a large part of Bella Vista and this is my first time serving and I'm not near as funny as Representative Milligan, but I'm looking forward to meeting you guys. Thank you. Thank you. And Thank you chair, uh, Wade Andrews, her district 98, um Bosto Columbia, Nevada and Lafayette counties. This is the 2nd term on this committee. And I think I've got about 30 small years before I can even be eligible for retirement benefits. That's OK, you're working toward it. All right, at this time I'd love to, uh, uh, introduce you to our staff. We have Blake Gillam, uh, that I've gotten to work with before and he's here at the table with us, uh, Destiny Davis. Uh, is our committee assistant and then Laura Holshauser is our committee attorney. I don't, is Laura here? All right, so. We'll look forward to working with you guys. Uh, art for the House members, uh, each of you have an alternate, alternates may only vote when uh you. The actual members are absent. So the retirement committee will meet upon adjournment of the House and Senate on Tuesdays, uh, in this room each week until we get all the bills covered. Uh, the last day to file a retirement bill has been extended by 4 days. It will be Friday, January 31st. Uh, because, uh, of the 4 day break that we just had, we got to extend it by 4 days, so spread the word that Friday, January 31st is the last day to file a retirement bill. So If nobody has an objection, we're going to plan to do our committee photo next Tuesday. So, uh, if y'all will spread the word. Uh, to the other members who are not here that we're gonna have committee photo next Tuesday at the beginning of our meeting. So Explaining the uh agenda process, uh, our agendas are prepared 2 days before each committee meeting, so that would be on Friday for our Tuesday meetings. Uh, legislators who have bills on the agenda, uh, will be sent a sponsor notification, uh, in their actuarial cost study, uh, the day before the committee meeting. Uh, bills listed on today's agendas or in the order referred, uh, to the committee. Uh, for future meetings, bills will be listed under the various status headings based on when we received the actuarial cost studies for each bill. I'm going to introduce you to the directors for uh each of the retirement systems and also our actuarial, uh, man who has been working with us for a good while here in just a few minutes. So at this time, uh, we need to cover a few motions to allow us to do business. So, uh, first one I need is motion to give the co-chairs the authority to play shell bills under the deferred section until amended, once amended bills can be placed on the agenda as ready for action or send to the actuary. So All right, got a motion, have a second. All right, we got a motion in a second. Any discussion. All those in favor say aye. And he opposed same sign. Motion carries. All right, the next motion is to give co-chairs the authority to immediately send all bills requiring extra studies to the committee actuary once the bill is referred to the committee. And, all right, motion. Second, all right. Any discussion? All those in favor say aye, and he opposed same sign. Motion carries. Third one is a motion to give co-chairs the authority to send amended bills to the committee actuary if the amendment requires an additional actuary study. So Can I get a motion? Motion 2. All right. Any discussion? All those in favor say aye. Any oppose same sign? Motion carries, and then the last one. I need a motion to explain, oh. OK. All right, uh. Oh, OK. This is just information. Any bill that increases the multiplier and these are terms that if you haven't been on the committee, you'll be hearing. Please don't Be afraid to ask any of us terms that don't look familiar to you. We've been there before. But any bill that increases the multiplier changes terms of or allowing the purchase of credit credited service, shortening vesting periods, or shortening the years of service required for standard retirement without penalty. Excuse me. Or which would establish a new or expanded public retirement programs. Requires 2/3 vote. Of the committee, which is 14 votes. All other bills require a simple majority of 11 votes. So This time I want to recognize the retirement system directors and actuary. If you would please stand when I call you. David Clark. Is the director of local police and fire retirement system that is referred to as Loy. Amy Fetcher. Is the director of Arkansas Employee retirement System that is referred to as apers. Robin Smith Is the director of Arkansas State Highway Employees retirement system that's referred to as Ashers. And then Mark White is the director of Arkansas Teacher retirement system. That's just ATRS. Then our actuary is Jody Carrero. How many years have you been working with us, Jody takes that long? Um. OK, I knew it had been a long time. Jodie does an outstanding job for us and we review his contract every 2 years. OK. Do any of the members have any questions of our directors or our actuary. OK. Anything else to come before the committee. This is just an informational committee will begin next week. No other business. This committee is adjourned.