H. B. 4618

(By Mr. Speaker, Mr. Kiss, and Delegate Martin)

[Introduced February 22, 2000; Referred to

the Committee on Pensions and Retirement then Finance.]






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 public employees retirement system; clarifying that no less than ten days of service by any member may be credited as one month of service; clarifying that no member may receive more than one year of credited service for any calendar year; clarifying the definition of interim sessions; increasing the time limit to purchase retroactive service credit; clarifying that no interest be paid upon certain purchases of retroactive service credit; and setting forth a method of calculation for final average salary in certain cases.

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; retroactive provisions.
(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 as the board of trustees shall from time to time adopt and based upon the following:
(1) In no event may less than 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 each ten days employed in 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) Except for hourly employees, ten or more months of service credit earned in any calendar year shall be credited as a year of service: Provided, That 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 no days may be carried over by a member from one calendar year to another calendar year where the member has received a full year credit for that year; and
(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)(3) 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 terms of employment are otherwise classified as temporary and who are employed to perform services required by the Legislature for its regular sessions or during the interim time between regular sessions shall receive service credit for the time served in that capacity in accordance with the following. For purposes of this section the term "regular session" means day one through day sixty of a sixty-day legislative session or day one through day thirty of a thirty-day legislative session. 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 time between regular sessions and who have been or are employed during regular sessions or during the interim time between regular sessions in seven consecutive calendar years, as certified by the clerk of the houses in which the employee served, shall receive service credit of six months for all regular sessions served, as certified by the clerk of the houses in which the employee served, or shall receive service credit of three months for each regular thirty-day session served prior to one thousand nine hundred seventy-one, as certified by the clerk of the houses 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: Provided, That no more than one year of service may be credited to any temporary legislative employee for all service rendered by that employee in any calendar year and no days may be carried over by a temporary legislative employee from one calendar year to another calendar year where the member has received a full year credit for that year . Service credit awarded for legislative employment pursuant to this section shall be used for the purpose of calculating that member's retirement annuity, pursuant to section twenty-two of this article, and determining eligibility as it relates to credited service, notwithstanding any other provision of this section. Certification of employment for a complete legislative session and for interim days of interim sessions shall be determined by the clerk of the houses in which the employee served, based upon employment records. Service of fifty-five days of a regular session constitutes a an absolute presumption of service for a complete legislative session, and service of twenty-seven days of a thirty-day regular session occurring prior to one thousand nine hundred seventy-one constitutes a an absolute presumption of service for a complete legislative session. Once a legislative employee has been employed during regular sessions for seven consecutive years or has become a full-time employee of the Legislature, that employee shall receive the service credit provided in this section for all regular and interim sessions, and interim days worked by that employee, as certified by the clerk of the houses in which the employee served, regardless of when the session or interim legislative employment occurred: Provided, however, That regular session legislative employment for seven consecutive years may be served in either or both houses of the Legislature.
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 further, That no legislative employee and no current or former member of the Legislature 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: And provided further, 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, two thousand two five, whichever occurs last: And 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. Any service credit purchased shall be credited as six months for each sixty-day session worked and three months for each thirty-day session worked, and credit for interim sessions employment as provided in this subsection: And provided further, That this legislative service credit shall also be used for months of service in order to meet the sixty-month requirement for the payments of a temporary legislative employee member's retirement annuity: And provided further, That no legislative employee may be required to pay for any service credit beyond the actual time he or she worked regardless of the service credit which is credited to him or her pursuant to this section: And provided further, That any legislative employee may request a recalculation of his or her credited service to comply with the provisions of this section at any time.
(e) Notwithstanding any provision to the contrary, the seven consecutive calendar years requirement and the service credit requirements set forth in this section shall be applied retroactively to all periods of legislative employment prior to the passage of this section, including any periods of legislative employment occurring before the seven consecutive calendar years referenced in this section.
(f) In calculating final average salary for legislative service and temporary legislative employment, the board shall use the following rules. A member of the Legislature shall receive one full year of service credit for each sixty day session of the Legislature, consistent with the fifty-five day presumption set forth above. In calculating final average salary for a temporary legislative employee the board shall cumulate all months of credited service to arrive at total years of service. The board shall determine the highest thirty-six months of credited service having the highest compensation and shall deem all months to be consecutive for purposes of calculation of final average salary . If the board is unable to precisely determine the thirty-six months of credited service having the highest compensation for a temporary legislative employee the board shall cumulate and sum any thirty- six months having the highest compensation: Provided, That in the event the board is unable to determine exactly the thirty-six months having the highest compensation, the board shall cumulate and sum the compensation from those months of the temporary legislative employee having the highest compensation which total as close as possible to thirty-six, but are greater than thirty-six. The board shall then divide this sum by the number of months of credited service cumulated to arrive at the sum and the quotient shall be the average monthly salary. The quotient shall then be multiplied by twelve to obtain the final average salary.



 Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken from the present law, and underscoring indicates new language that would be added.