Request By:
Mr. Mim Clark
General Manager
Kentucky Retirement Systems
226 West Second Street
Frankfort, Kentucky 40601
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Patrick B. Kimberlin, III, Assistant Attorney General
This is in response to your recent letter wherein you ask our opinion as to the following questions:
"Should retirement payments be suspended for a retired member who is re-employed in a seasonal, emergency, temporary or part-time position if he anticipates that he will receive calendar year earnings equal or greater than the maximum permissible earnings as provided by the Federal Social Security Act?
If payments are suspended, should member and employer contributions be withheld from wages and service credit granted for re-employed retirees classified as seasonal, emergency, temporary or part-time? "
The answer to your first question is yes. KRS 61.637(1) insofar as is here pertinent, states as follows:
"Monthly payments shall not be suspended for a retired member who is reemployed in a seasonal, emergency, temporary, part-time, or full-time position if he anticipates that he will receive less than the maximum permissible earnings as provided by the federal Social Security Act in compensation as a result of reemployment during the calendar year. "
We believe the language of the foregoing statutory provision clearly requires the suspension of retirement payments, providing the reemployed retired member anticipates that he will receive earnings equal to or in excess of that provided under federal law. Title 42 USC § 403.
The answer to your second question is also an unqualified yes. See KRS 61.637(2).