Senate Bill No. 184
(By Senators Bailey, Wooton, Chafin, Ball, Fanning and
Anderson)
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[Introduced January 20, 1998; referred to the Committee
on Pensions; and then to the Committee on Finance.]
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A BILL to amend and reenact section fourteen, article ten,
chapter five of the code of West Virginia, one thousand nine
hundred thirty-one, as amended, relating to the public
employees retirement system; service credit; and allowing
transfer of service with the state police.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That section fourteen, article ten, chapter five of the code
of West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as
amended, be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
ARTICLE 10. WEST VIRGINIA PUBLIC EMPLOYEES RETIREMENT ACT.
§5-10-14. Service credit.
(a) The board of trustees shall credit each member with the
prior service and contributing service to which he or she is
entitled based upon such rules and regulations as the board of trustees shall from time to time adopt and based upon the
following:
(1) Ten or more days of service rendered by a member in any
calendar month shall be credited as a month of service:
Provided, That for employees of the state Legislature whose term
of employment is otherwise classified as temporary and who are
employed to perform services required by the Legislature for its
regular sessions or during the interim between regular sessions
and who have been or are so employed during regular sessions or
during the interim between regular sessions in seven consecutive
calendar years, service credit of one month shall be awarded for
all or any part of each calendar month encompassed within a
regular legislative session, notwithstanding that the actual
number of days served in any one month of the regular session is
less than ten days, and service credit of one month shall be
awarded for each ten days served during the interim between
regular sessions, which interim days shall be cumulatively
calculated so that any ten days, regardless of calendar month or
year, shall be calculated toward any award of one month of
service credit;
(2) Ten or more months of service rendered in any calendar
year shall be credited as a year of service;
(3) No more than one year of service may be credited to any
member for all service rendered by him or her in any calendar
year; and
(4) Service may be credited to a member who was employed by
a political subdivision if his or her employment occurred within
a period of thirty years immediately preceding the date the
political subdivision became a participating public employer.
(b) The board of trustees shall grant service credit to
employees of boards of health, the clerk of the House of
Delegates and the clerk of the state Senate, or to any former and
present member of the state teachers retirement system who have
been contributing members for more than three years, for service
previously credited by the state teachers retirement system and
shall require the transfer of the member's contributions to the
system and shall also require a deposit, with interest, of any
withdrawals of contributions any time prior to the member's
retirement. Repayment of withdrawals shall be as directed by the
board of trustees.
(c) Court reporters who are acting in an official capacity,
although paid by funds other than the county commission or state
auditor, may receive prior service credit for time served in that
capacity.
(d) Employees of the state Legislature whose term of
employment is otherwise classified as temporary and who are
employed to perform services required by the Legislature for its
regular sessions or during the interim between regular sessions
may receive service credit for the time served in that capacity
in accordance with the following. Employees of the state Legislature whose term of employment is otherwise classified as
temporary and who are employed to perform services required by
the Legislature for its regular sessions or during the interim
between regular sessions and who have been or are employed during
regular sessions or during the interim between regular sessions
in seven consecutive calendar years, as certified by the clerk of
the house in which the employee served, shall receive service
credit of six months for each regular session served as certified
by the clerk of the house in which the employee served, and shall
receive service credit of one month for each ten days served
during the interim between regular sessions, which interim days
shall be cumulatively calculated so that any ten days, regardless
of calendar month or year, shall be calculated toward any award
of one month of service credit. Service credit awarded for
legislative employment pursuant to this subsection shall be used
for the purpose of calculating that member's retirement annuity
only, pursuant to section twenty-two of this article, and
notwithstanding any other provision of this section. Service
credit awarded for legislative service pursuant to this
subsection shall not be used to determine when an employment
period begins or ends, or to determine when the period of
eligibility or filing for retirement begins to run.
Certification of employment for a complete legislative session
and for days of interim sessions shall be determined by the clerk
of the house in which the employee served, based upon employment records. Service of fifty-five days of a regular session
constitutes a presumption of service for a complete legislative
session.
Any employee may purchase retroactive service credit for
periods of employment in which contributions were not deducted
from the employee's pay. In the purchase of service credit for
employment prior to the year one thousand nine hundred eighty- nine in any department, including the Legislature, which operated
from the general revenue fund and which was not expressly
excluded from budget appropriations in which blanket
appropriations were made for the state's share of public
employees' retirement coverage in the years prior to the year one
thousand nine hundred eighty-nine, the employee shall pay the
employee's share. Other employees shall pay the state's share and
the employee's share to purchase retroactive service credit.
Where an employee purchases service credit for employment which
occurred after the year one thousand nine hundred eighty-eight,
that employee shall pay for the employee's share and the employer
shall pay its share for the purchase of retroactive service
credit: Provided, That no legislative employee may be required
to pay any interest or penalty upon the purchase of retroactive
service credit in accordance with the provisions of this section
where the employee was not eligible to become a member during the
years he or she is purchasing retroactive credit for or had the
employee attempted to contribute to the system during the years he or she is purchasing retroactive service credit for and such
contributions would have been refused by the board: Provided,
however, That a legislative employee purchasing retroactive
credit under this section does so within twenty-four months of
becoming a member of the system or no later than the last day of
December, one thousand nine hundred ninety-nine, whichever occurs
last: Provided further, That once a legislative employee becomes
a member of the retirement system, he or she may purchase
retroactive service credit for any time he or she was employed by
the Legislature and did not receive service credit.
(e) The board of trustees shall grant service credit to any
former or present member of the state police death, disability
and retirement fund who has been a contributing member for more
than three years, for service previously credited by the state
police death, disability and retirement fund, and: (1) Shall
require the transfer of the member's contributions to the system;
or (2) shall require a repayment of the amount withdrawn any time
prior to the member's retirement: Provided, That there shall be
added by the member to the amounts transferred or repaid under
this paragraph an amount which shall be sufficient to equal the
contributions he or she would have made had the member been under
the public employees retirement system during the period of his
or her membership in the state police death, disability and
retirement fund plus interest at a rate determined by the board.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to allow former members
of the state police to receive service credit under the public
employees retirement system for such service.
Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken
from the present law, and underscoring indicates new language
that would be added.