WORDS TO WORK BY
Produce, Protect, and Provide the Promised Benefits
LACERA was created by the County Employees Retirement Law of 1937 (CERL) to administer the retirement plan benefits for the employees of Los Angeles County and outside Districts. Our purpose is two-fold: to achieve long-term growth and security for the retirement fund and to assure our members receive the lifetime benefits promised by their LACERA defined benefit retirement plans.
Our mission is weighty, its ramifications great. The benefits we diligently provide carry more than just monetary value; they represent security and a promised fulfilled. We never lose sight of that. LACERA is dedicated to serving our members and their beneficiaries with expertise and efficiency.
Below are highlights of fiscal year 2008-2009 achievements:
ADMINISTRATIVE
SERVICES DIVISION
Our Administrative Services Division remained focused on providing vital daily support services to our
organization, including procurement, budget administration, facilities management, document processing, and mail distribution. The division also oversees special programs, such as Health & Safety, Risk Management, Records Management, and Business Continuity.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Administrative Services’ Document Processing Center (DPC) scanned, indexed, and provided same-day processing on approximately 200,000 documents, which amounted to over 600,000 pages of member information.
- DPC processed approximately 335,000 mail pieces, including more than 130,000 responses to member inquiries.
- The Budget Unit worked with management to develop a spending plan to support a ten percent
association-wide expenditure reduction over the previous year.
- Our Facilities Management team completed renovation of new work areas for the Disability Retirement Services and Retiree Health Care divisions. The renovation meets additional workspace requirements and provides enhanced security for sensitive information.
CLAIMS PROCESSING DIVISION
LACERA’s Claims Processing Division serves active and retired members and their survivors by efficiently processing retirement plan benefits and providing exceptional member service.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Processed 90 percent of active member requests within 21 days.
- Maintained a 97.71 percent accuracy level on overall benefit processing.
- Processed 2,399 new retirees and survivors; 98.67 percent were paid within one payroll cycle.
COMMUNICATIONS DIVISION
The Communications Division provides timely retirement, policy, and service information to members and staff. In the course of operations, the division creates web sites, newsletters, brochures, annual reports, special mailings, videos, and presentations.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Created new Summary Plan Description Books for all LACERA retirement plans and developed a plan book section on lacera.com that will be updated regularly.
- Expanded My LACERA, the member section of lacera.com to a 20+ web page section with enhanced capability to allow retirees and survivors to adjust and submit tax withholding elections online.
- Produced the fifth annual Countywide LACERA Resource Conference for Human Resource Professionals, featuring presentations from Claims Processing, Disability, Member Services, and Human Resources.
- Partnered with the Financial & Accounting Services Division to create LACERA’s 2007-2008 annual report, which earned an award from the Government Finance Officers Association.
- Expanded and updated the association’s web sites: lacera.com, employee intranet, board web site, HR Professionals site, and KBase internal online knowledge source.
- Produced quarterly newsletters: Spotlight on Retirement and PostScript.
- Developed web and Spotlight content for Staying Healthy Together: Focus on Wellness.
DISABILITY RETIREMENT SERVICES DIVISION
Disability Retirement Services continued to investigate and process disability retirement applications in a timely and efficient manner. Other fiscal year activities included the relocation of the division to a more secure area and a recruitment program for disability retirement hearing officers that attracted 180 applicants.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Processed and presented 383 disability applications and referee recommendations to the Board of Retirement (BOR).
- Assisted County departments in placing disability retirement applicants in permanently modified assignments and presented 15 Salary Supplement Allowance disability retirement applications to the BOR.
- Participated in 62 interactive meetings between County return-to-work coordinators and their disabled employees.
- Presented disability retirement material at 18 County educational and training seminars.
- Served as presenters at LACERA’s Resource Conference for County HR professionals.
- Provided disability retirement information to 319 members at LACERA’s Public Counter.
HUMAN RESOURCES
Human Resources staff continued to recruit new employees and provide support and training to all LACERA employees.
Fiscal Year Accomplishments:
- Researched, coordinated, and managed enrollment for offsite skill-building workshops for over 100 staff members; contracted and managed enrollment of onsite training for more than 251 staff members.
- Developed first LACERA Management Academy in which 25 members of LACERA management participated.
- Conducted 23 recruitments, yielding 19 new hires and 10 promotions.
- Orchestrated Mentoring Program — a series of voluntary one-on-one sessions whereby seasoned LACERA professionals coach less experienced staff on professional development; 57 staff members participated.
- Implemented an Employee Commute Reduction Plan in compliance with South Coast Air Quality Management District (AQMD) Rule 2202.
- Enhanced organization’s RideShare Program, added two new vanpool groups, bringing the total to eight. Earned Metro RideShare Diamond Award from L.A. County Metropolitan Transportation Authority for the third year running.
- Promoted LACERA as a premier employer at local college recruitment fairs. Provided one-on-one career coaching services to college students.
INTERNAL AUDIT
Internal Audit continued to partner with LACERA management, staff, and boards to ensure the association’s network of risk management, controls, and governance processes were adequate and functioning.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Completed an organization-wide risk and control assessment.
- Completed 95 percent of the audit projects included in the FY 08-09 Annual Audit Plan.
- Completed 76 audit projects, resulting in the enhancement of LACERA’s risk-control processes.
LEGAL OFFICE
In accordance with the Board of Investments’ (BOI) 2001 Securities Litigation Policy, our Legal Office maintained its commitment to monitor securities fraud class actions and aggressively pursue recovery of losses suffered by LACERA as a result of incidents involving corporate corruption and fraud.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Welcomed Robert Van Der Volgen as LACERA’s new Chief Counsel.
- Joined other public pension systems as a named plaintiff in a class action securities fraud lawsuit against Merrill Lynch and other defendants. The case is pending in U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York.
- Joined other institutional investors in an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief in Merck & Co., Inc., v. Reynolds, a case pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. The case involves the statute of limitations in a suit claiming federal securities fraud.
MEMBER SEVICES DIVISION
The Member Services Division served LACERA members with increased accuracy, efficiency, and professionalism. The division continues to focus on improving the high level of service we offer our members.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Answered over 124,500 telephone inquiries from members.
- Provided one-on-one counseling to 13,799 members at our Public Counter.
- Presented 431 workshops serving 9,773 people at 197 County locations.
- Processed and/or replied to 1,823 emails and 1,982 letters.
- Introduced a new staff evaluation program as part of our continuing focus on quality assurance.
- Initiated a veteran staff retraining program. Our Correspondence Unit is the first to successfully complete this extensive refresher course on LACERA processes and procedures.
- Collaborated with other divisions in the implementation of a Call Center recording system. The recordings become a permanent part of a member’s records. The system also enhances quality control.
QUALITY ASSURANCE & METRICS DIVISION
The Quality Assurance & Metrics Division (QA) continued to create strategies and policies to promote accuracy, productivity, and compliance.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Audited 9,670 Claims Processing and Members Services Divisions transactions to monitor accuracy, timeliness, and volume of services provided to members.
- Continued to update the business process procedures available to LACERA staff on the organization’s intranet.
- Completed a special project requiring resolution of 1,200 cases.
- Delivered 956 hours of training to staff on business processes and changes in the retirement law.
RETIREE HEALTH CARE DIVISION
Under an agreement with the County of Los Angeles, LACERA administers a Health Care Benefits Program that provides medical and dental/vision benefits for more than 40,000 retirees/survivors and their eligible dependents. Additionally, LACERA sponsors a Long-Term Care Program for that population.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Implemented premium rate changes for 2009 plan year, mailed the annual letter and insurance rate booklet, along with Notice of Creditable Coverage to more than 40,000 members.
- Continued facilitation of the Medicare Part D Retiree Drug Subsidy (RDS) for the LACERA-administered Health Care Benefits Program, including the completion of applications and reconciliation with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
- Maintained LACERA’s retiree wellness program, Staying Healthy Together: Focus on Wellness, by providing a series of health-related print and web campaigns, along with half-day workshops.
- Implemented 2009 plan year premium rate changes for the Local 1014 medical plan.
- Continued actuarial reporting of post-employment benefits within the LACERA-administered Health Care Benefits Program, in accordance with the Governmental Accounting Standard Boards (GASB) Statements No. 43 and 45.
SYSTEMS DIVISION
The Systems Division remained focused on implementing program updates to increase the security of sensitive member information, enhance procedural efficiency, and augment member services.
Fiscal Year Achievements:
- Built and implemented a new application to generate Additional Retirement Credit (ARC) cost estimates based on member data on file.
- Expanded the capabilities of My LACERA on lacera.com to:
- Allow members to access a broader scope of their LACERA account data.
- Expand access to include survivors and deferred members, in addition to retirees and active members.
- Provide retiree and survivor access to images of their Direct Deposit Automatic Deposit Receipts and Form 1099-Rs.
- Include a new self-service feature on My LACERA to allow retirees and survivors to adjust and submit their federal and California State tax withholding elections online.
- Designed new program to identify compensation adjustments not included in scheduled earnings, recalculate final compensation, compute back deductions owed, and generate written notice to the member.
