By KRWG News
Las Cruces – The New Mexico Educational Retirement Board will be in Las Cruces tomorrow (Tuesday) to get feedback from employees on plans to overhaul their pension plan.
The ERB oversees the pension system for thousands of state workers in public schools, colleges, and universities.
Employees have been paying a much higher pension contribution, 11.15 percent .and in many cases, combined with no wage increases .resulting in a reduction in take home pay.
The temporary higher contributions are scheduled to expire in the summer of 2014 ..if that happens, employees will contribute 7.9 percent of their pay to the plan .with the state paying 13.9 percent.
But the ERB has proposed six different overhaul options .and none of them would keep those rates. Only one option proposed would keep the employee contribution rate at 7.9 percent .but it would reduce the state contribution to 9.15 percent. Furthermore, that plan would eliminate cost of living adjustments for retirees and raise the minimum retirement age to 62. All of the other ERB overhaul proposals would raise the employee contribution to 9.9 percent and make other changes, most significantly a minimum retirement age. The current plan uses age and years of service to determine pension eligibility. The ERB proposals all include minimum retirement ages .as low as 50 years of age and as high as 62.
The ERB meeting with employees will be held tomorrow (Tuesday) night at 6pm in the Gerald Thomas Hall auditorium at New Mexico State University.