Introduced
by
To extend to public employee pensions the same protection against being alienated (taken) in a bankruptcy procedures as that afforded under current law to private sector pensions. The bill is part of a legislative package which includes House Bills 5108-5114. House Bill 5109 amends the state employees pension act.
Referred to the Committee on Appropriations
Passed in the House 101 to 0 (details)
Substitute offered
To replace the previous version of the bill with a version that includes the state employee “early out” retirement incentive proposal previously contained in House Bill 5732. (See <a href="/bill.asp?ID=7610">House Bill 5732</a> for the details.) The substitute was amended to tie bar the bill to <a href="/bill.asp?ID=6536">House Bill 5112</a>, which was substituted to insert the judges early retirement incentive proposal announced by the governor two days previously. Currently, judges retirement benefits are capped after 16 years in office at 60 percent of a judge's final salary, no matter how many additional years are served. This would be increased to 80 percent for judges who have served at least 24 years, increasing their annual pension by $28,000. The retirement incentive is part of a proposed realignment of probate, district, and circuit court boundaries in the more sparsely-populated northern part of the state, in order to ease the operation of Family Courts. The substitute was also amended to require transfers from the retirement health care sub-account to the regular pension fund to be approved by legislative appropriations committees, and to extend the enhanced retirement benefits to certain former state mental health employees of the privatized Macomb-Oakland Regional Center.
The substitute passed by voice vote
Amendment offered
by
To allow retiring state employees to use accumulated sick leave pay, which otherwise would be paid gradually over several years, to purchase additional pension-enhancing service time credit.
The amendment failed 15 to 19 (details)
Amendment offered
by
To allow qualified corrections employees to take advantage of the enhanced pension benefit offer, except that they would not then be granted the already-enhanced benefits now paid to corrections pensioners between the ages of 51 and 62 (a two-percent of highest salary times years served multiplier, vs. 1.5 percent after age 62).
The amendment failed 18 to 19 (details)
Amendment offered
by
To break the tie-bar to House Bill 5112, which contains the judges' early retirement pension enhancement proposal. Under the tie-bar, the state employee early retirement pension enhancement proposal will not go into effect unless the judges' proposal also is passed.
The amendment failed 15 to 22 (details)
Amendment offered
by
To prohibit any "non-essential" employee who takes advantage of the "early out" pension enhancement from being employed by a private entity on a state contract for a period of two years.
The amendment failed 18 to 19 (details)
Amendment offered
by
To allow certain corrections department employees who are military veterans to apply two-years of military service toward the number of years required to qualify for a state pension.
The amendment passed 20 to 17 (details)
Amendment offered
by
The amendment passed 20 to 17 (details)
Passed in the Senate 36 to 0 (details)
To authorize a one-time early retirement incentive for certain state employees who retire between July 1 and November 1, 2002. (This proposal was originally contained in House Bill 5732.) State employees whose combined age and years of service totaled 80 as of November 1, 2002, would be eligible to elect to take advantage of the offer during a signup window of April 1 to April 30, 2002. The incentive would increase the multiplier used to calculate the retirement benefits of these employees from 1.5 percent to 1.75 percent of highest salary times the number of years served, which would increase the cash portion of their pension benefits by 16.7 percent. The bill also contains a provision to create a new pension fund retirement health care sub-account, which would pay for future state retiree health care benefits. This sub-fund would receive from the regular pension fund any contributions in excess of the amount deemed sufficient under actuarial and accounting standards to cover future pension expenses. In years when employee pension contributions were less than this amount, money could be transferred from the health care sub-fund to the pension fund, subject to approval by legislative appropriations committees. Also, the bill includes a provision which requires an application for a duty disability retirement pension to be filed no later than one year after termination of employment. The early-out offer was proposed by the governor as a way to balance the FY 2002-2003 state budget without additional cuts in state spending. This bill originally just extended to state employee pensions the same protection against being alienated (taken) in a bankruptcy procedures as that afforded under current law to private sector pensions, and this provision is still included. The bill is tie-barred to <a href="/bill.asp?ID=6536">House Bill 5112</a>, which contains an early retirement pension enhancement proposal for judges.
Received
Substitute offered
by
To reconsider the vote by which the bill was passed.
The substitute passed by voice vote
Substitute offered
by
To strip out the substituted language authorizing a one-time early retirement incentive for certain state employees who retire between July 1 and November 1, 2002. That proposal is now back in House Bill 5732. The tie-bar to House Bill 5112, which had been substituted to contain an early retirement pension enhancement proposal for judges, is also broken, and the judges program has been withdrawn.
The substitute passed by voice vote
Passed in the Senate 36 to 0 (details)
To reverse the previous Senate-passed version, and just extend to state employees' pensions the same protection against being alienated (taken) in a bankruptcy procedures as that afforded under current law to private sector pensions. The bill is part of a legislative package which includes House Bills 5108-5114.
Received
To concur with the Senate-passed version of the bill.
To reverse the previous Senate-passed version, and just extend to state employees' pensions the same protection against being alienated (taken) in a bankruptcy procedures as that afforded under current law to private sector pensions. The bill is part of a legislative package which includes House Bills 5108-5114.
Passed in the House 103 to 0 (details)
To concur with the Senate-passed version of the bill.
