{"id":30594,"date":"2021-05-27T08:00:40","date_gmt":"2021-05-27T14:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=30594"},"modified":"2021-05-27T08:00:40","modified_gmt":"2021-05-27T14:00:40","slug":"legislature-overrides-veto-state-will-manage-ops-retirement-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=30594","title":{"rendered":"Legislature overrides veto; state will manage OPS retirement plan"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lawmakers voted May 26 to override the governor\u2019s veto of a bill that authorizes a state takeover of management duties for the Omaha school retirement plan.<\/p>\n

\"Sen.
Sen. Mark Kolterman<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

LB147, sponsored by Seward Sen. Mark Kolterman, transfers duties and responsibilities for management of the OPS plan from the Omaha School Employees Retirement System board of trustees to the Public Employees Retirement Board, which manages the rest of the state\u2019s plans through the Nebraska Public Employees Retirement Systems.<\/p>\n

The transfer will take effect Sept. 1, 2024. The school district, board of education, board of trustees and the PERB must finalize a transfer of management agreement by Dec. 31, 2021.<\/p>\n

LB147 passed May 20 on a 38-3 vote.<\/p>\n

In his veto message, Gov. Pete Ricketts called the measure a \u201cslippery slope\u201d toward the state eventually assuming responsibility for the troubled retirement plan\u2019s nearly $1 billion unfunded liability. He characterized LB147 as the \u201cpivotal step\u201d in a series of moves by OPS designed to shift the plan\u2019s financial burden to the state.<\/p>\n

\u201cState management erodes the distinction between the state\u2019s existing school retirement plan and the OPS pension plan,\u201d Ricketts said. \u201cWithout clear distinctions, future legislators will likely assume responsibility over both plans, which has always been OPS\u2019s intention.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kolterman offered a motion to override the veto, which he called a \u201cdisappointment.\u201d He noted that the bill contains an explicit provision that OPS remains \u201cat all times and in all circumstances solely liable\u201d for all the plan\u2019s funding obligations.<\/p>\n

He said he \u201ccan\u2019t imagine a scenario\u201d in which lawmakers ever will vote to take on the OPS plan\u2019s unfunded liability.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t see that happening,\u201d Kolterman said. \u201cThere\u2019s nothing in this bill that results in a cost to the State of Nebraska.\u201d<\/p>\n

Omaha Sen. Justin Wayne supported the motion, saying LB147 will allow teachers at OPS to return to focusing on students rather than managing their retirement plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cDoes it make sense for educators to be pension fund managers?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

North Platte Sen. Mike Groene opposed the motion. He said the bill is an incremental step toward OPS asking the state to assume liability for the plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cEventually, this will become the state\u2019s responsibility,\u201d Groene said.
\nThe measure includes components of three additional bills related to the transfer, all sponsored by Kolterman.<\/p>\n

Provisions of LB145 require completion of a compliance audit by Nov. 15, 2021, and the first annual audit by the state auditor by July 1, 2022.<\/p>\n

Lawmakers voted 31-18 to override the governor\u2019s veto. Thirty votes were required.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lawmakers voted May 26 to override the governor\u2019s veto of a bill that authorizes a state takeover of management duties for the Omaha school retirement plan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30579,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[16],"tags":[143],"class_list":["post-30594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-retirement-systems","tag-sen-mark-kolterman"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/LB147Kolterman5-26-21a.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30594"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30594\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30596,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30594\/revisions\/30596"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/30579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}