Pension board looks to close doors
St. Clare’s corporation files petition to dissolve amid financial woes
A corporation responsible for the troubled pension plan for former St. Clare’s Hospital workers is seeking to end its legal existence.
Last fall, the corporation announced that 1,100 workers at the religiously affiliated hospital would get either no pension or a reduced check because the fund was short tens of millions of dollars. That left workers shocked and Albany Roman Catholic Diocese Bishop Edward Scharfenberger promising to find a way to help.
Late Tuesday, an email sent from the corporation’s email account to local media outlets announced the corporation was “winding up its affairs” and had filed a petition in state Supreme Court to dissolve legally.
Attempts to reach corporation Chairman Joe Pofit for comment were unsuccessful. A reply to the email was not returned.
Since St. Clare’s merger with Ellis Hospital in 2008, the corporation’s only duty has been to oversee the workers’ pension fund.
The email continued that the corporation had “completed the termination of the St. Clare’s Hospital pension plan in February. The pension plan paid out approximately $30 million in benefits to St. Clare’s retirees in the termination.”
It added that “among its final acts, St. Clare’s Corporation contributed $505,000 to the pension plan to be included in
the final distribution to eligible plan participants. The corporation also donated its final remaining assets of $51,100 to Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Albany, to be used exclusively as a pensioner relief fund for the benefit of St. Clare’s retirees.”
Diocesean spokeswoman Mary Deturris Poust said the bishop “was aware that the money would be given to Catholic Charities and placed in a ‘restricted fund’ solely for the benefit of pensioners.”
She added, “As a board member, Bishop Scharfenberger was involved in the discussion related to the dissolution.”
Previously, Pofit has said the fund would need at least $29 million to restore reduced pensions to more than 660 former workers
who have lost all benefits.
That would bring pensions up to 70 percent of what had been promised, which is now what is being provided to 434 workers who had retired before November 2015. Pofit has said the pension fund would run out of cash entirely by 2024 if pensions were not slashed.
David Pratt, an Albany Law School labor law professor who is assisting the former St. Clare’s workers, said the corporation “cannot walk away from any legal liability” for pension woes by dissolving its existence.
Pratt said efforts by the pensioners to get state assistance for the fund added to the proposed 2019-20 budget so far appear to be unsuccessful.
As part of the 2008 merger with Ellis, the St. Clare’s pension fund got $28.5 million from the state. At the time, this amount was believed to be sufficient to
support the fund for the lifetime of its remaining workers.
During the 1990s, officials at St. Clare’s Hospital sought and received federal approval for a religious exemption for its pension, which up to that point was federally insured as a private plan. The hospital then got a $90,000 refund for its previous premiums, but the plan was then left uninsured from fiscal calamity.
The fund was also exempted from requirements that could have alerted former workers of potential financial underperformance.
Founded in Schenectady by Catholic priests and Franciscans in 1949, St. Clare’s from its beginnings has been linked to the Albany Roman Catholic Diocese. Bishops also have served on the hospital board of directors.