Ohio School Employees Retirement System, Columbus, made three new commitments totaling $115 million, said Tim Barbour, pension fund spokesman.
The $12.7 billion pension fund committed $50 million to AMP Capital Global Infrastructure Fund. It is the pension fund’s first commitment to a fund managed by AMP Capital Investors, and it falls within the pension fund’s global real assets allocation. The target to global real assets is 15%, and the actual allocation as of June 30 was 15.6%. Whether the pension fund has committed to previous AMP Capital funds could not be learned by press time.
Also, the pension fund committed $65 million to private equity. It committed $40 million to middle-market buyout fund Kohlberg Investors VIII, managed by Kolhberg & Co., and $25 million to Swander Pace Capital VI, a lower middle-market buyout fund. The pension fund previously committed $40 million to Kohlberg Investors VII in 2011 and $40 million to Swander Pace Capital V in 2012.
Separately, the board at its meeting Sept. 16 approved changes to the pension fund’s cost-of-living adjustment formula, which requires state legislative approval. The new COLA would be indexed to the consumer price index, but not greater than 2.5%. The current COLA is 3%.
Also, those who begin receiving benefits on or after Jan. 1, 2018, would begin to see their COLA applied on the fourth anniversary date after they begin receiving benefits. For those receiving benefits before that date, the COLA would be suspended for three years, resuming on the first anniversary date after Jan. 1, 2021.
A reason for the changes, according to a guide on the pension fund’s website, is to get the pension plan’s funding ratio up to 70% in 2018 and 90% in 2034. The funding ratio as of June 30, 2015, was 68%.
