Deals & People September 23, 2016

Retirement Industry People Moves

Segal Names National Director of Multiemployer Consulting; and Cammack Expands into Southeast With Addition of Consultant.
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Segal Names National Director of Multiemployer Consulting

The Segal Group has announced that its senior vice president and benefits consultant David Brenner has been appointed as the firm’s national director of multiemployer consulting.

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“David has spent his career devoted to working with trustees of multiemployer benefits plans to help improve their participants’ health and retirement readiness,” says incoming president and CEO David Blumenstein. “He is uniquely qualified to lead our multiemployer business because of his wide-ranging knowledge of the issues, opportunities and challenges trustees currently face. We are excited to have him take on this role.” 

Brenner will be tasked with leading Segal’s Multiemployer Leadership Group. He currently specializes in consulting to multiemployer funds including health and welfare plans, defined benefit (DB) pension plans and defined contribution (DC) pension plans. He also serves on the working committee of the National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer Plans (NCCMP).

Before coming to Segal in 1995, Brenner was a trustee of a multiemployer health and welfare fund, as well as a DB pension plan in Massachusetts. He is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and holds a bachelor’s degree with an individual concentration in labor studies. He received a Juris Doctor degree from Northeastern University’s School of Law.

Brenner succeeds Blumenstein, who will become president and CEO of The Segal Group on October 1.

The Segal Group is an independent firm of benefit, compensation and human resources consultants headquartered in New York.

NEXT: Cammack Expands into SoutheastWith Addition of Consultant  

Cammack Expands into SoutheastWith Addition of Consultant

Cammack Retirement Group, an independent retirement plan consulting and investment advisery firm, has hired Joey Payne as vice president and senior consultant. He is tasked with providing the firm’s services to colleges and universities, as well as other nonprofits, health care organizations, and corporate plan sponsors.

Payne joins Cammack Retirement from the University of Kentucky, where he served as chief benefits officer overseeing all of the university’s benefit plans, including numerous retirement plans and the medical program. He was also the executive director of the Know Your Rx Coalition, which is available for any non-profit higher education and health care institution or public sector organization. 

"I am extremely excited to join Cammack Retirement Group,” Payne says. “The firm has a great reputation within higher education, health care and tax-exempt markets. There is also a common theme of helping plan sponsors establish proper fiduciary processes, lowering plan expenses, and facilitating retirement readiness for plan participants.”

Jeff Levy, Cammack Retirement’s managing partner, added, “We are thrilled to add Joey’s extensive knowledge and experience in higher education and tax-exempt organizations to our firm, and his presence in the south-central United States to expand our footprint, as we serve clients on a nationwide basis.” 

Compliance September 23, 2016

Bill Would Allow Small Employers to Participate in Open MEPs

The Retirement Enhancements and Savings Act of 2016 includes many other provisions that address plan sponsors' needs and questions.
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The U.S. Senate Committee on Finance has approved a bill that would open the door for employers to participate in open multiple employer plans (MEPs), as well as provide nondiscrimination testing relief permanently to closed defined benefit (DB) plans and a fiduciary safe harbor for selection of lifetime income solution providers.

According to a summary of Committee Chairman Senator Orrin Hatch’s (R-Utah) modifications to the Retirement Enhancements and Savings Act of 2016, the bill would provide that small businesses could join MEPs to share the administrative burden and costs of a retirement plan. It would prevent all businesses participating in a MEP from losing their tax-preferred status if one business fails to meet the necessary criteria, and would allow for one Form 5500 to be filed for MEPs.

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The proposal applies to years beginning after December 31, 2019, and to Forms 5500 for plan years beginning after December 31, 2019.

The bill also would specify measures that a plan fiduciary may take with respect to the selection of an insurer and a guaranteed retirement income contract in order to assure that the fiduciary meets the prudent man requirement.  The measures under the proposal are an optional means by which a fiduciary will be considered to satisfy the prudent man requirement with respect to the selection of insurers and guaranteed retirement income contracts and do not establish minimum requirements or the exclusive means for satisfying the prudent man requirement.

Research has shown plan sponsors may be hesitant to offer in-plan guaranteed retirement solutions in part due to a lack of safe harbor from the Department of Labor (DOL).

The bill would also make permanent the nondiscrimination relief provided for closed DB plans.

Other provisions in the bill would clarify that employees of nonqualified church-controlled organizations, in addition to employees of churches and qualified church-controlled organizations, may be covered under a section 403(b) plan that consists of a retirement income account; establish Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) premiums for Cooperative and Small Employer Charity (CSEC) pension plans; change the after-death required minimum distribution rules applicable to defined contribution (DC) plans and IRAs; allow earnings on elective deferrals under a section 401(k) plan, as well as qualified nonelective contributions and qualified matching contributions (and attributable earnings), to be distributed on account of hardship.  In addition, the bill provides that a distribution is not treated as failing to be on account of hardship solely because the employee does not take any available plan loan.

More information is here.

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