Senate passes amended KTRS bill, House passes bill aimed at groups exiting KRS

Chamber supported pension measure heads to Governor’s desk

The House passed the final version of House Bill 62, sponsored by Rep. Brent Yonts, on Tuesday afternoon.  HB 62 will ensure that any entity wanting to withdraw from the Kentucky Retirement System repays its unfunded liability. 

The Kentucky Chamber believes the state cannot allow independent organizations – many of which lobbied to be included in the retirement system – to escape their liability, leaving remaining retirees and taxpayers on the hook and commends Rep. Yonts and the legislature for passing this important measure.  

Senate passes KTRS bonding bill-removes the bonding and creates interim study

The Senate passed House Bill 4, as amended by a committee substitute, on Tuesday afternoon.  The committee substitute removes the original language of the bill, which would allow KTRS to bond $3.3 billion dollars, and replaces it with the creation of an interim legislative task force to conduct a thorough review of KTRS funding issues, using independent outside experts, and recommend strategies to address the funding gap and unfunded liabilities.  

The Chamber recommended this exact proposal in March of 2014 to address this pension issue and has expressed concerns about moving forward with the decision to bond $4.4 billion without a deeper look into the system’s practices.  

House Bill 4, as amended by the Senate Committee substitute, passed 26-10.  The bill now heads to the House and likely to a conference committee to see if a compromise can be met.