The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) announced today that it has approved the application submitted to the Special Financial Assistance (SFA) Program by the Cement Masons Local Union 681 Pension Plan (Local 681 Plan). The plan, based in Houston, Texas, covers 195 participants in the construction industry.
The Local 681 Plan became insolvent in August 2016. At that time, PBGC started providing financial assistance to the plan. As required by law, the Local 681 Plan reduced participants’ benefits to the PBGC guarantee levels, which were roughly 15 percent below the benefits payable under the terms of the plan.
PBGC’s approval of the SFA application enables the plan to restore all benefit reductions caused by the plan’s insolvency and to make payments to retirees to cover prior benefit reductions. SFA will enable the plan to pay retirement benefits without reduction for many years into the future. The plan will receive $10.8 million in SFA, including interest to the expected date of payment to the plan.
“The Special Financial Assistance approved today means that these 195 construction workers and retirees will receive the full retirement benefits they earned,” said U.S. Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh, chair of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation’s Board of Directors. “Since 2017, they have been receiving reduced pension payments through no fault of their own. Today’s action, made possible by President Biden’s American Rescue Plan, restores those benefits and delivers the secure retirement they were promised.”
In addition to the $10.8 million of SFA paid to the plan, PBGC’s Multiemployer Insurance Program will be repaid $5.4 million which is the amount of the plan’s outstanding loans, including interest, for the financial assistance PBGC provided beginning in August 2016 and ending on the expected date of payment of SFA to the plan.
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