Benefits Committee
Meeting Minutes: January 22, 2008
Faculty and Staff Benefits Office
Bldg. 7, Woodrail Center
Al Hahn called the meeting to order at 10:00 a.m.
Those present included June Deweese, David Mehr, Jack Batterson, Debra Denham, Barbara Savio, John Bauman, Michael Paden and Marjorie Leavene.
It is anticipated that the UM Retirement, disability and Death Benefit Plan annual report will be available March 2008. Limited numbers of the report are available in hard copy; but the report is available on line. No major changes are foreseen for the UM benefits package.
At its recent meeting, the system benefits committee reviewed the retirement pension plan and has forwarded two recommendations to the Curators. Current pensions are roughly 10% off the desired benchmark. One recommendation would be a 1.084% increase for retirees which would bring rates up to the August 1996 CPI. The other recommendation would be for a 3.5-3.8% increase which would be roughly 20% of the benchmark discrepancy.
Concern was expressed about comments made at an earlier Board of Curators meeting suggesting a cut in retiree benefits. Paden assured committee members that funding was currently available to fund the benefits and that the University had a moral and legal obligation to continue funding the program. In the event the financial situation would change, any changes to the current benefit policy would not affect current or soon-to-be retirees.
A more pressing concern is with health care. A new option for retirees will become available July 1, 2008. This is a co-pay program. Key to this program is Medicare. The federal government currently will not let self-insured program to take advantage of this program. Retirees will have the ability to opt in and out of the program during the annual benefit change time period. This flexibility is due to unknown factors regarding Medicare. No changes to the Express Scripts program are anticipated at this time. In an effort to steer users into a more cost effective method for procuring prescription drugs, the benefits office has arranged a 3-month supply of maintenance drugs at the University Pharmacy at the same price level as Express Scripts. Drug costs and histories of individual purchases is available on line at www.express-scripts.com.
Coventry is the University administrator of claims for retirees under the age of 65; Great West (recently purchased by Cigna) administer claims for Medicare-eligible retirees.
Information sessions on Tax-deferred programs and pre-retirement programs are offered on a regular basis. The committee suggested that any wording indicating that persons who are within five years of retirement should attend the pre-retirement programs be eliminated. In today’s market, five years may be too short a time frame for such planning.
One of the charges of the committee is to select the recipients for the MURA retirees of the year awards (one staff, one faculty member). February 1, 2008 is the deadline for nominations. The committee agreed that staff would evaluate and rank staff nominations, faculty will do the same for faculty nominations. The committee as a whole will select the winners.
Staff Benefits office currently offers the benefits booklets to staff in a CD format and sends reminders and updates via e-mail. Al Hahn will contact Ernest Hildebrand to see if this benefit could be extended to retirees. i.e., do a majority of retirees have internet access.
The University is developing a 403B Roth program. This program is available to part-time employees but not retirees.
It was suggested that we ask the MURA president to address the committee regarding the national climate for retiree benefits, since the president regularly attends national meetings on this subject.
Mike Paden said that state law requires the all benefit changes be reported and that his information in available at www.jcper.org, the web site for the Joint Committee on Public Employee Retirement.
Future meeting minutes will be mailed to members via e-mail.
The next meeting will be held Tuesday, February 19, 2008, at 10:00 a.m. at the same location.
Respectfuly submitted,
Marj Leavene
