The 2025 legislative session is underway in Frankfort, and officials on the Public Pension Oversight Board recently heard about a bill that would make it easier for state employees to leave additional benefits to their special needs children.
Senator Robin Webb is the author of Senate Bill 58. She filed this bill first last year, but since it was introduced late in the session, it did not get any traction. This year she said she’s eager to introduce discussion about her bill and its benefits.
“It establishes the ability for a state employee to designate as a beneficiary a special needs trust. And I think, with the work that we’ve attempted to do in the general assembly in addressing special needs and those individuals, this would be a natural progression of taking care of those individuals and providing our state employees some peace of mind,” said Webb.
She said the bill will allow workers to leave their pension in a special needs trust to be used for medical and dental care, as well as hygiene and general upkeep. Webb said right now there isn’t a way for employees to do this, and simply leaving the benefits to that child could have unintended consequences.
“For state employees specifically, they don’t have the mechanism for their retirement benefits to be directed to that special needs trust. If they would leave that, any resource to that individual they could go over their income threshold, so it would come into play with federal criteria,” said Webb.
But the board wasn’t convinced. Some members said they didn’t understand the need for the legislation, as there are other ways of achieving a similar result. But Webb stressed that this would be the best and easiest way to ensure that special needs children are cared for. She said several state employees had approached her to talk about this, wanting to see this change made. She also clarified that this would only be for direct familial lines, aiming to provide for special needs children of state employees.