Board of Regents to consider changing pay day
Changing the payroll date to the beginning of the month could produce $10.9 million for mobile computing.
Amy Poppinga
Issue date: 10/15/08 Section: News
The way employees in the South Dakota regental system get paid could soon change, and this has some workers concerned about how that could affect their retirement.
The Board of Regents proposed a plan to move pay day from the last working day of the month to the first. The change would take effect in July 2009, and by changing the payroll date from June 30, 2009, to July 1, 2009, the state will push the expense for one payroll into a new budgeting and fiscal year. The one-time budget surplus will amount to $10.9 million.
The BOR is hoping to get the Legislature's approval of the plan so it can move forward with a mobile computing initiative. This initiative would require all students at South Dakota's public universities to rent or buy a mobile computer and would help universities move to wireless Internet environments.
Robert T. Tad Perry, executive director of the BOR, said many incoming students went to high schools that had mobile computing environments, and so if a university is less technologically advanced than their high school, the students will probably go somewhere else.
"If we want to compete for students, we have to make sure we have a technological environment," said Perry.
Students will need to purchase or rent their own laptops, but the BOR needs the $10.9 million to train faculty to use technology in the classroom, update classrooms and set up a wireless system on all campuses.
Apart from raising money for the mobile computing initiative, the proposed pay date change will also affect some BOR employees' pocketbooks. These employees will not lose any money from their paycheck, but for employees retiring in the next three years, their retirement accounts will be hit.
The South Dakota Retirement System (SDRS) figures employees' retirement benefits based off their salary during the highest 12 consecutive calendar quarters (three years) in the last 10 years. For almost all employees, the highest 12 quarters are their final three years of employment. For those who retire in the next three years, though, the last 12 quarters will not be the highest because they will only receive 11 paychecks for calendar year 2009.
The Board of Regents proposed a plan to move pay day from the last working day of the month to the first. The change would take effect in July 2009, and by changing the payroll date from June 30, 2009, to July 1, 2009, the state will push the expense for one payroll into a new budgeting and fiscal year. The one-time budget surplus will amount to $10.9 million.
The BOR is hoping to get the Legislature's approval of the plan so it can move forward with a mobile computing initiative. This initiative would require all students at South Dakota's public universities to rent or buy a mobile computer and would help universities move to wireless Internet environments.
Robert T. Tad Perry, executive director of the BOR, said many incoming students went to high schools that had mobile computing environments, and so if a university is less technologically advanced than their high school, the students will probably go somewhere else.
"If we want to compete for students, we have to make sure we have a technological environment," said Perry.
Students will need to purchase or rent their own laptops, but the BOR needs the $10.9 million to train faculty to use technology in the classroom, update classrooms and set up a wireless system on all campuses.
Apart from raising money for the mobile computing initiative, the proposed pay date change will also affect some BOR employees' pocketbooks. These employees will not lose any money from their paycheck, but for employees retiring in the next three years, their retirement accounts will be hit.
The South Dakota Retirement System (SDRS) figures employees' retirement benefits based off their salary during the highest 12 consecutive calendar quarters (three years) in the last 10 years. For almost all employees, the highest 12 quarters are their final three years of employment. For those who retire in the next three years, though, the last 12 quarters will not be the highest because they will only receive 11 paychecks for calendar year 2009.
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