By Chris Cassidy
STAFF WRITER
—
The governor signed legislation yesterday that dramatically shakes up the Essex Regional Retirement Board after years of financial mismanagement, secret meetings and taxpayer-funded getaways.
New board members will be chosen and the state will gain the power to place the board into receivership under the language Gov. Deval Patrick inked into law as part of the state budget yesterday afternoon.
The reforms come at the end of the most turbulent year in the history of the Essex Regional Retirement Board, a period that culminated with a 23-point state audit claiming the board and then-Executive Director Timothy Bassett repeatedly broke the law.
"It's a good victory for clean government," said Senate Majority Leader Fred Berry, D-Peabody.
The legislation redefines the way the five members of the board are chosen and specifically prohibits the type of improper behavior Bassett was sharply criticized for. The executive director will no longer be able to simultaneously serve as a board member. And no board member or employee can also serve as a state lobbyist, like Bassett did.
The state's Public Employee Retirement Administration Commission would be able to place the board into receivership if it continued to break the law — a highly unlikely scenario given the board's dramatic changeover in the last few months.
Ipswich Town Manager Robert Markel — one of the first public critics of the board — welcomed the reforms, but noted that the board had already begun to change shortly after Bassett's firing. In March, the state appointed Swampscott Town Administrator Andrew Maylor to replace Bassett as chairman. Since then, the board has stopped spending massive amounts on high-priced law firms and lobbyists and changed the ways it posts meeting notices, agendas and minutes.
Nearly all the board members with ties to Bassett have now either resigned or foregone re-election.
"I think it comes a little bit late," Markel said. "We supported the legislation, but events moved very quickly after the board fired Tim Bassett."
In fact, Markel said the legislation may even slow down some of the reforms the board had already started, including searching for a replacement for Bassett as executive director.
That's because under the legislation, new board members would be selected, likely ending Maylor's chairmanship.
While the legislation Patrick signed yesterday brings dramatic change to the Essex Regional Retirement Board, it leaves out the broader language governing how retirement boards across the state would be run — something the Senate had approved earlier this year.
Under a bill filed in the spring, PERAC would be granted authority to place any retirement board in the commonwealth into receivership if it's found to be breaking the law — something many feel might have halted the years of wrongdoing at Essex.
"I wish that section of the legislation had been retained," Maylor said, "because if it happened here, who says it can't happen somewhere else?"
The bill would also toughen procurement laws and require retirement board members to file financial disclosure forms.
State Sen. Bruce Tarr, R-Gloucester, said the bill, which is stuck in the House Ways and Means Committee, may not be dead, even with a month to go in the current legislative session.
"I think we may well see that," Tarr said. "There are a lot of moving pieces to pension reform, and I think it's still a live issue."
Meanwhile, municipal leaders like Markel admit the board has come a long way in the last few months. The days of spending tens of thousands of dollars on conferences to far-flung locations like Las Vegas and San Diego seem to be over, at least for now.
"We'd just be in shock at what was happening there," Markel said. "That kind of stuff might have happened in Massachusetts government 30 years ago. But it just doesn't happen now. This was kind of a holdover from the bad old days when these kinds of shenanigans were common."
Staff writer Chris Cassidy can be reached at ccassidy@salemnews.com.
