Two years ago, the Daily Mail’s Zack Harold obtained a list of West Virginia pension system recipients who collected more than $80,000 in benefits a year. The project, which Zack dubbed the $80,000 Pension Club, included a database with the names and total amount every single person collecting a pension in West Virginia over the threshold.
This summer, Sam Speciale and I decided to update Harold’s initial project. So, we once again filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the West Virginia Consolidated Public Retirement Board.
The database below is what we received from the board – although not exactly because they gave us some ugly documents we had to clean up.
Instead of exactly replicating Zack’s work, Sam and I also asked for the benefit start dates and the number of years an individual contributed to the retirement system. These two additions will provide a few additional insights that you might find interesting while exploring the pension database.
For example, despite contributing for just 7 and 8 years, Robert Claus and Jeffrey Leach, respectively, are among the top 15 pension recipients in the state. Both men are annually taking in over $113,000 from the State Troopers retirement system.
Another insight we discovered by asking for the benefit start date was this little nugget: About 57 percent of the total people who currently receive more than $80,000 in pension benefits each year have joined the list since 2009.
There are some minor things you should know about the database.
1) It is sortable by category. So if you want to see it in alphabetical order, just press on the button at the top of the list under the first or last name. If you want to do it by amount, pension system, or benefit start date, click the button at the top of the list.
2) This list is as of August 5, 2015. Other people will undoubtedly retire between now and the end of the year but the list is accurate as of that date.
3) Since the Daily Mail’s initial 2013 request, 67 more people are receiving benefits of $80,000 or more. In 2013, there were 98 members of the $80k pension club – today, there are 165.
In terms of sheer monetary totals, those receiving $80,000 or more amassed $9.2 million in 2013.
This year, the $80,000 pension club members totaled $15.5 million.
It is also worth noting some of the changes between the 2013 list and the 2015 one.
For example: in 2013, judges had the most number of recipients in the $80k club. But today, judges fell to number three and were overtaken by state troopers and teachers.
You should also note one man – Robert Rothlisberger – is categorized as Public Employee NS. Sam discovered that’s because recipients in the Public Employees Retirement System are separated into two categories — state employees and non-state employees. State employees, as their name would suggest, worked for the state of West Virginia. Non-state employees are those who worked for a city, county commission or any other local government agency not affiliated with the state. There is only one non-state employee drawing more than $80,000 in annual benefits — and that’s Rothlisberger, who has received $87,061 each year since 2011.
Also notable is that C. Reeves Taylor does not have an amount in the contributing years. We are trying to figure out why and have requested this information with the pension board. Once we get this information, we will update the database.
That’s all for now – oh and we will permanently place the database on the $80,000 Pension Club page, which you can find in the upper right hand corner of this blog.
