STATEMENT TO

[First Reprint]

SENATE, No. 758

with Assembly Floor Amendments

(Proposed by Assemblywoman DOWNEY)

ADOPTED: MAY 20, 2021

      These floor amendments reopens the Workers Compensation Judges Part of the Public Employees’ Retirement System (PERS) and requires Workers’ Compensation Judges to be enrolled in PERS.  The amendments also remove a provision in the bill permitting a Workers’ Compensation Judge to elect not to transfer into PERS.

      The floor amendments remove a provision of the bill requiring the laws and regulations of the Judicial Retirement System (JRS) to apply to Workers” Compensation Judges in PERS in the same manner as a judge enrolled in the JRS, notwithstanding that the Workers’ Compensation Judge is not in the JRS.

      The floor amendments provide that service credit transferred from a participant in the Defined Contribution Retirement Program under the bill would be recognized as service credit to determine eligibility for employer-paid health care benefits in retirement pursuant to current law.

      The floor amendments also provide that a workers compensation judge who retired on or after May 20, 2021 and who was not transferred and enrollment pursuant to the bill would be retroactively transferred and enrolled in the Workers Compensation Judges Part of PERS.