Oregon-Based Employer to Restore $20.6M in Pension Assets, Unwind Illegal Real Estate Purchases

Oregon-based The R.B. Pamplin Corp. and its chairman, president and CEO, Robert Pamplin, must restore more $20.6 million to the company’s pension plan after Pamplin used pension assets to make real estate acquisitions that violated ERISA, according to a December 2024 consent judgment filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon that was announced by the Department of Labor last week.

Properties invested in by the pension fund included rangeland, a vineyard, an island, an office building and irrigated cropland, according to a September 2024 filing by the DOL against Pamplin and his company.

Pamplin admitted to using money from the company’s pension fund to acquire interests in more than 27 company-owned properties since 2019. Under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act, employer-owned real estate cannot exceed more than 10% of the fair market value of the assets of the plan. The company, based in Portland, Oregon, is an industrial services company that manufactures, distributes and operates wine, agriculture, concrete, textiles, news, entertainment and retail businesses.

Pamplin will have to unwind $15.4 million worth of real estate investments from the plan and will have to reimburse to the pension fund any lost earnings that could have accrued if the plan had been “invested properly.” Pamplin will also be banned from serving as a fiduciary to an ERISA-covered employee benefit plan. 

“The evidence proves that Dr. Pamplin violated ERISA by failing in his duty to protect and secure his employees’ promised pension benefits. The department will closely monitor compliance with this judgment to ensure he and his company meet their legal obligations,” said the DOL’s San Francisco-based regional solicitor, Marc Pilotin, in a statement. “We remain committed to holding plan fiduciaries accountable when they break the law and fail to keep their promises.”

Gallagher Fiduciary Advisors LLC will serve as the pension fund’s independent fiduciary and investment manager responsible for bringing the plan into compliance with ERISA, including selling all imprudent real estate holdings.