Bill Text: HI SB2870 | 2020 | Regular Session | Amended

Hawaii Senate Bill 2870 (Prior Session Legislation)

Bill Title: Relating To Employees' Retirement System Disability Retirement.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1-0)

Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2020-02-14 - Report adopted; Passed Second Reading, as amended (SD 1) and referred to JDC. [SB2870 Detail]

Download: Hawaii-2020-SB2870-Amended.html

THE SENATE	S.B. NO.	2870
THIRTIETH LEGISLATURE, 2020		S.D. 1
STATE OF HAWAII

A BILL FOR AN ACT

RELATING TO EMPLOYEES' RETIREMENT SYSTEM DISABILITY RETIREMENT.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

SECTION 1. The Employees' Retirement System of the State of Hawaii's ("ERS") service-connected disability retirement and accidental death provisions are intended to provide benefits different than those of Hawaii's workers' compensation program. The paramount purpose of Hawaii's workers' compensation law is to provide compensation for an employee for all work-connected injuries, regardless of questions of negligence, and the legislature has decided that work injuries are among the costs of production that industry is required to bear. Accordingly, the workers' compensation statute is to be construed liberally in favor of awarding compensation, and specifically creates a presumption that an employee's claim is for a covered work injury, in exchange for providing an employer with exclusion of all other liability on account of a work injury (except for sexual harassment, sexual assault and infliction of emotional distress, or invasion of privacy).

There are no similar policies or purposes behind the ERS's service-connected disability retirement and accidental death provisions. Consequently, the ERS's service-connected disability retirement and accidental death provisions do not contain a presumption favoring coverage, and should not be construed liberally in favor of awarding compensation for all injuries and death occurring in the workplace, regardless of questions of ERS membership position, negligence, proximate cause, the difference between an accident and injury/incapacity, and the burden of proof. Courts in the cases of Pasco v. Bd. of Trustees of the Employees' Ret. Sys., 142 Haw. 373, 420 P.3d 304 (2018), as corrected (May 29, 2018), as corrected (June 4, 2018), as corrected (June 15, 2018), Stout v. Bd. of Trustees of the Employees' Ret. Sys., 140 Haw. 177, 398 P.3d 766, reconsideration denied, 141 Haw. 90, 404 P.3d 1279 (2017), Panado v. Bd. of Trustees, Employees' Ret. Sys., 134 Haw. 1, 332 P.3d 144 (2014), and Fores v. Bd. of Trustees of the Employees' Ret. Sys., Civ. 14-1-1270-06, Circuit Court of the First Circuit, recently rendered rulings awarding ERS service-connected disability retirement and accidental death benefits beyond the legislature's original intent.

These rulings have required the ERS to provide service-connected disability retirement and accidental death benefits that were never contemplated in determining employer contributions, employee contributions, and employee benefits (including monthly retirement allowance benefits to be provided for an extended duration and at a higher rate, plus the refund of employee contributions), and consequently, increased the State's unfunded liability as a whole. Furthermore, ERS members are not foreclosed from collecting ERS service retirement, ERS ordinary disability retirement, ERS ordinary death, workers' compensation, or social security disability; the ERS's service-connected disability retirement and accidental death programs should therefore not be awarded in a manner similar to an award of ERS service retirement, ERS ordinary disability retirement, ERS ordinary death, workers' compensation, and social security disability benefits.

If there is any perceived ambiguity regarding the legislative intent of the ERS's service-connected disability retirement and accidental death statutes, as reflected in recent court decisions, this bill addresses such perceived ambiguities.

SECTION 2. Section 88-79, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended by amending subsection (a) to read as follows:

"(a) Under rules the board of trustees may adopt, upon application of a member, or the person appointed by the family court as guardian of an incapacitated member, any member while employed in a position in which all contributions required to be made to the employees' retirement system by the employee or the employer, or both, have been made, who has been permanently incapacitated for duty as the natural and proximate result of an accident occurring at a definite and exact time and place while in the actual performance of duty [~~at some definite time and place~~], or as the cumulative result of some occupational hazard, through no wilful negligence on the member's part, may be retired by the system for service-connected disability; provided that[:

~~(1)~~ In] in the case of an accident occurring after July 1, 1963[~~, the~~]:

(1) The employer shall file with the system a copy of the employer's report of the accident submitted to the director of labor and industrial relations;

(2) An application for retirement is filed with the system within two years of the date of the accident, or the date upon which workers' compensation benefits cease, whichever is later;

(3) Certification is made by the head of the agency in which the member is employed, stating the time, place, and conditions of the service performed by the member resulting in the member's disability and that the disability was not the result of wilful negligence on the part of the member; and

(4) The medical board or other entity designated by the board of trustees certifies that the member is incapacitated for the further performance of duty at the time of application and that the member's incapacity is likely to be permanent."

SECTION 3. Section 88-336, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended by amending subsection (a) to read as follows:

"(a) Under rules the board of trustees may adopt, upon application of a class H member, or the person appointed by the family court as guardian of an incapacitated member, any class H member, employed in a position in which all contributions required to be made to the employees' retirement system by the employee or the employer, or both, have been made, who has been permanently incapacitated for duty as the natural and proximate result of an accident occurring at a definite and exact time and place while in the actual performance of duty [~~at some definite time and place~~], or as the cumulative result of some occupational hazard, through no wilful negligence on the member's part, may be retired by the system for service-connected disability; provided that[:

~~(1)~~ In] in the case of an accident occurring after July 1, 1963[~~, the~~]:

(1) The employer shall file with the system a copy of the employer's report of the accident submitted to the director of labor and industrial relations;

(2) An application for retirement is filed with the system within two years of the date of the accident, or the date upon which workers' compensation benefits cease, whichever is later;

SECTION 4. Statutory material to be repealed is bracketed and stricken. New statutory material is underscored

SECTION 5. This Act shall take effect on July 1, 2051.

Report Title:

Employees' Retirement System; Service-Connected Disability; Accidental Death

Description:

Clarifies the Employees' Retirement System's eligibility requirement definitions for service-connected disability and accidental death benefits. Effective 7/1/2050. (SD1)

The summary description of legislation appearing on this page is for informational purposes only and is not legislation or evidence of legislative intent.