Those of you who watched the ORSC meeting on June 13th, know that it was a very interesting meeting. You also know that, at the end of that meeting, Senator Mark Romanchuk, Chair of the ORSC, created the ORSC STRS Subcommittee.
The new ORSC STRS Subcommittee will meet:
Monday, July 8, 2024 1:00 pm ET Statehouse Room 121
This subcommittee is comprised of:
Sen. Romanchuk (Chairman)
Rep. Plummer
Rep. Brown Piccolantonio
Dr. Anthony Podojil
The agenda is attached to this post.
On the agenda is a discussion of S.B. 342, enacted in 2012.
For those of you who may not be aware, S.B. 342 is the bill passed in 2012 that granted the STRS Ohio Board the authority to adjust the COLA.
This authority was also granted to the Boards of SERS and HPRS.
Prior to S.B. 342, the Boards of all five public pension funds in Ohio required the approval of the Ohio legislature to adjust the COLA.
That's called legislative oversight.
STRS, SERS, and HPRS lost that legislative oversight in 2012.
And in the case of STRS, S.B. 342 led to the "adjustment" of the COLA from 3% to 2% to 0%.
It's important to note that the Boards of OPERS and OP&F were not granted the authority to adjust the COLA. Members of OPERS and OP&F retained the oversight of the Ohio legislature to protect their COLA.
Also, for those of you who may not be aware, Ohio's legislators belong to OPERS, as do the employees of STRS.
Ohio's legislators retained legislative oversight of their COLA, while members of STRS, SERS, and HPRS were thrown under the bus.
You will be able to watch the livestream of the ORSC STRS Subcommittee on the Ohio Channel.
We can expect another interesting meeting.
