Products October 14, 2011

Tyler Technologies Acquires K-12 HR Solutions Provider

October 14, 2011 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - Tyler Technologies, Inc. announced it has acquired Windsor Management Group, L.L.C. (WMG).
Reported by

WMG provides an integrated suite of financial and human capital management solutions to the K-12 education market through its product, Infinite Visions enterprise software.

As a result of the transaction, more than 800 school districts in 31 states currently served by WMG will become Tyler customers, and WMG’s approximately 60 employees will join Tyler. WMG’s software and services will complement Tyler’s other school solutions.  

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Tyler acquired Windsor Management Group and its assets for $23.5 million in cash, subject to certain working capital adjustments. WMG, based in Tempe, Arizona, had total revenues of approximately $12 million in 2010, including approximately $7.8 million in recurring revenue.

Benefits October 14, 2011

RI Pension Overhaul Proposal Includes Move to Hybrid Plan

October 14, 2011 (PLANSPONSOR.com) – Rhode Island lawmakers are circulating the draft of a pension-overhaul proposal.
Reported by

According to the Providence Journal, the law would suspend annual cost-of-living increases for retirees for years, match the Social Security retirement age, and move all state and local employees and public school teachers enrolled in the state-run pension system into a new hybrid plan after July 1, 2012.  

Under the new hybrid plan, for each year of work after July 1, 2012, employees would be guaranteed 1% of their highest five-year salary average, but they would be entitled to a pension benefit after five years, instead of 10. Their required contributions would also drop, from 8.75% for state employees and 9.5% for teachers, down to 3.75%, and from 7% to 2% for those municipal workers promised COLAs in retirement, and from 6% to 1%, for those for whom no COLAs have been promised.   

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In the new hybrid plan, employees would contribute 5% in return for the “employer” — which means the state, or, in the case of municipal workers, each city and town — contributing another 1% on their behalf.   

The Journal said the proposal recognizes that roughly 40% of the public school teachers in Rhode Island, and a number of municipal employees, work in communities that do not pay into Social Security. Both they and their employer would pay an additional 2% into this savings plan on their behalf.  

Under the proposal, annual cost-of-living adjustments for retirees would be suspended until the state pension fund — now among the worst-funded in the nation — reaches 70% funding for partial reinstatement or, for full reinstatement, 80%, a target that could take up to 15 years, under one of several scenarios that the state’s pension consultant laid out for a study group this summer, according to the news report. But at whatever point these COLAs are reinstated, retirees could get an annual increase of up to 4%, depending on how the state’s pension fund investments are faring. This new “risk-adjusted COLA” would be applied to the retiree’s first $35,000 in benefits.   

The Journal noted that the proposal has not yet been finalized, and it may change before its expected rollout next week. 

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