Posted on: Wednesday, September 25, 2002

OHA trustees join state pension plan

By Vicki Viotti
Advertiser Staff Writer

Office of Hawaiian Affairs trustees will join the state pension fund next month, thanks to a new law they hope to amend next spring to help them build their retirement fund faster.

OHA board members have been on the state payroll of salaried elected officials since 1993, but only now have the option to start accumulating a pension.

Yesterday, trustees who heard a presentation by the Employees Retirement System staff expressed some dismay that they wouldn't be able to catch up as quickly as they had hoped.

The pension plan puts the trustees on par with state lawmakers, Namu'o said. Assuming annual pay remains at the current $32,000 level, a trustee who retires after 10 years of service would earn an annual pension of $11,200 a year, he said.

Starting with their Oct. 15 paychecks, trustees will start seeing payroll deductions to the pension fund. They can add to the fund with monthly contributions through retirement credit for years served, back to 1993.

But the law limits such buy-back contributions to small monthly amounts until trustees complete five years of payments; then they can make larger payments to build up their retirement credit quickly, said ERS administrator David Shimabukuro.

Trustee Rowena Akana, who has been on the board since 1990, said she doesn't want to wait so long to build a pension fund for the nine years that she's eligible.

OHA will go back to the Legislature to seek a change in the law so trustees can speed their payments, Namu'o said.

"If we had known about the buy-back provision, we would have incorporated language to make the buy-back easier," he said.

Namu'o added that any former trustee serving since 1993 would be eligible to invest in the pension fund under the same terms.