After 10 weeks of the legislative session, the nine ATRS bills (the ATRS appropriation bill and eight ATRS Board package bills) are well along in the legislative process. At this time, it looks like 8 of the 9 bills will become law. Seven of the 9 bills are already law with official Act numbers. An eighth bill has been delivered to Governor Hutchinson for consideration. The remaining package bill is HB1132, the ATRS tax credit bill, that passed one chamber of the General Assembly but was held in the Senate Revenue and Tax Committee as the content of the bill was addressed in a broader discussion on tax credits. ATRS accepts that HB1132 is now a casualty of the negotiation process on broader recycling tax credit issues that also affect ATRS. The result of those negotiations that ATRS and others have undertaken is SB844. SB844 has passed the Senate and is headed to the House Revenue and Tax Committee next week.

SB844 was drafted after many hours of discussions and negotiations. ATRS thinks SB844, if passed, will benefit ATRS and the State of Arkansas by allowing the state to have a better defined tax credit impact each fiscal year while providing a steady income stream to ATRS over a period of many years, not only on Phase I of Big River Steel, but on future expansions of the facility.

ATRS continues to monitor legislation that could impact ATRS but has nothing new to report this week, other than SB844. ATRS will continue to provide weekly updates on the ATRS package bills and any other bills that have an impact on ATRS. After the session wraps up, ATRS will provide a final broader update that explains the impact of all the legislation that is ultimately become Acts in the 2015 session of the General Assembly.

Remember that ATRS has a new website that allows members to have direct access to specific member account information. Now 4,000 members have direct account access to account information. Here is the link to the instructions to sign up: https://www.artrs.gov/general/director-updates/716-08-15-2014-executive-director-update-the-new-atrs-website.

You can sign up to obtain these executive director updates through your private email address. Updates are made throughout the year such as at retirement season and other times when information needs to be shared. Now, over 8,000 people have signed up to receive this executive director by listserve email. You can find the link to sign up for listserve delivery to these updates here: https://www.artrs.gov/login.

In addition, over 10,000 people have access to the ATRS executive director updates via direct email delivery.  It is always a great pleasure for ATRS staff to learn of more ways to provide information to ATRS members, employers, and beneficiaries.  The ATRS Board is committed to providing a system that is member friendly and transparent.

You can also get helpful ATRS information on the ATRS Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/arkansasteacherretirementsystem under the name of Arkansas Teacher Retirement System.  Over 2,300 Facebook users get updates via the ATRS Facebook page. Go to the Facebook page and "like" ATRS to get daily updates. I try to go to the Facebook page every day to post information and answer member questions about ATRS.  In addition, if you use Twitter, you can follow events at ATRS and issues of interest by finding the Twitter ID of ATRS or find George Hopkins in the Twitter directory. The link is https://twitter.com/atrs.  ATRS is here to serve you!

Respectfully,

George Hopkins  

Click on the following document(s) for more information:

90th General Assembly; Narrative

Status and Summary of ATRS Bill Package