County employees' retirement: Contra Costa County.

The County Employees Retirement Law of 1937 authorizes counties and districts to establish retirement systems pursuant to its provisions in order to provide pension benefits to their employees. The law defines a district for these purposes and includes specified county retirement systems within that definition. The law generally provides that the personnel of a county retirement system are county employees, but also authorizes the board of retirement in specified counties to appoint certain personnel who are designated employees of the retirement system. This bill would make the Contra Costa County retirement system a district for purposes of the County Employees Retirement Law of 1937. The bill would authorize the board of retirement to appoint a retirement administrator and other personnel as required to accomplish the necessary work of the board and would authorize the administrator to make appointments on its behalf. The bill would provide that these employees are employees of the retirement system, not the county, and would except them from civil service provisions and merit system rules that would otherwise apply. The bill would make the retirement board a public agency for purposes of collective bargaining and provide that the compensation of the personnel so employed by the board is an expense of the system. The bill would require the retirement system to retain, for a 90-day transition period, nonprobationary county employees employed at the retirement system's facilities who were covered by a memorandum of understanding, as specified. The bill would provide that, during the 90-day transition period, probationary employees would maintain only those rights they had pursuant to their employment with the county. The bill would require the retirement system to recognize as the exclusive representative of the former county employees who are retained, as specified, those recognized employee organizations that represented the employees when they were employed by the county, and would require that the initial terms and conditions for those employees be as previously established. The bill would make technical and conforming changes in relation to these provisions.