AB 963: Teachers’ Retirement Law.

Existing law, the Teachers Retirement Law, establishes the Defined Benefit Program of the State Teachers Retirement Plan, which provides a defined benefit to members of the program. The defined benefit is based on final compensation, credited service, and age at retirement, subject to certain variations. The State Teachers Retirement System (STRS) is administered by the Teachers Retirement Board. Existing law establishes the Cash Balance Benefit Program, also administered by the Teachers Retirement Board, as a separate benefit program within the State Teachers Retirement Plan in order to provide a retirement plan for persons employed to perform creditable service for less than 50% of full-time service.

This bill would revise and recast the definition of creditable service for purposes of the Defined Benefit Program and the Cash Balance Benefit Program, as specified. The bill would, among other things, include as creditable service for the purposes of the Defined Benefit Program any activities that do not meet the definition of creditable service but were performed for an employer, as defined, on or before December 31, 2015, and were reported as creditable service to STRS. The bill would revise the definition of member to include any person who has performed those activities. The bill would allow members and specified retired members who have performed those activities to irrevocably elect to have that service subject to coverage under a different public retirement system and excluded from coverage by the Defined Benefit Program, as specified. The bill would also allow a person who had service for those activities removed from STRS and reported to a different public retirement system, as directed by STRS, to make an irrevocable election to have all of that service and subsequent service in the same position be subject to coverage by the Defined Benefit Program and excluded from that other system.

Among other things, the bill would require employers, upon request of the system, to provide the system with information relating to certification qualifications, minimum standards, or provisions of approved school charters to perform creditable service, as specified. The bill would include within the definition of creditable service specified activities performed by consulting teachers in the California Peer Assistance and Review Program.

The bill would make other conforming, nonsubstantive changes.