By Liz Zemba

Published: Friday, January 25, 2013, 12:01 a.m.
Updated: Friday, January 25, 2013

Fayette County's retirees will not get a cost-of-living increase in their checks this year.

Retirees will receive their first monthly checks for 2013 on Jan. 31. Total payroll for the 210 pensioners is $188,630, according to county Controller Sean Lally.

The retirement board, which consists of Lally, Treasurer Robert Danko and all three county commissioners, voted unanimously in December not to grant cost-of-living raises to retirees.

Lally on Thursday attributed the decision to a $1.4 million contribution the county will have to make to the pension fund this year. For years, the county did not have to make an annual retirement fund contribution, but that changed with the stock market slump of 2008.

Had the board granted a raise, it would have required the county to make annual payments for the next 10 years to the fund that would have ranged between $69,348 to $107,978.

Lally said the amount required would have depended on the percentage of raise granted. That payment would have been in addition to the annual retirement contribution.

Lally and Commissioner Al Ambrosini said that the pension fund is improving, now that a new company is managing it.

Since Pierce Park Group of West Chester began to manage the fund in July, it has grown by $3 million, they said.

The fund, Lally said, now has nearly $55 million in assets and the cost to manage it has decreased from $268,000 in 2011 to $242,000 in 2012.

The last time retirees received a cost-of-living adjustment was in 2011. There were no increases in 2009 or 2010.

Liz Zemba is a staff writer for Trib Total Media. She can be reached at 412-601-2166 or lzemba@tribweb.com.

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