Retirement Board seeking Bassett pension reduction from state

LYNN – The Retirement Board’s bid to reduce former public library trustee Linda Bassett’s pension could prompt legal action by the Marblehead woman.
Her attorney, Andrew Oatway, told board members they have no authority to reduce the roughly $3,000 annual pension Bassett receives for her trusteeship and warned efforts to do so will be an error of law that will have to be remedied later.
That threat did not keep the board from voting to ask state pension officials to seek an amended schedule recalculating Bassett’s benefits. The $3,000 she receives for her library service is part of a $22,000 annual pension paid to the former Lynn teacher and North Shore Community College instructor.
Bassett served as a trustee from 1980 to 1986 but the board claims she failed to attend a trustee meeting after March, 1984 until her resignation. Retirement Board Chairman Michael Marks and fellow members want the state to reduce Bassett’s pension to reflect the two years she did not attend meetings.
?She was not only given credit for a volunteer, non-paying job but she didn’t show up. It’s pretty obvious if you’re going to be a trustee, you show up. It’s outrageous,” Marks said.
Bassett did not attend Tuesday’s board meeting, but Oatway said a trustees? handbook mandating attendance at every trustee meeting was prepared more than 10 years after Bassett left the board.
He said there were other ways Bassett could have served the library as a trustee besides attending meetings, but Marks challenged that assertion.
?She failed to attend a meeting, not a single meeting, for a period of two and a half years. We assume people who serve actually give some service,” Marks said.
In addition to asking the state to amend Bassett’s pension, the Retirement Board is waiting to see if a Boston agency will take action against former Lynn development director Jansi Chandler.
State retirement officials say Chandler received $151,000 in excess earnings since 2000 from the Boston Redevelopment Authority and asked the BRA to recover the money from Chandler.
The BRA has until late June to indicate if and how it plans to collect the money. If it opts not to recover the earnings, the Lynn Retirement Board could vote to collect the money.
Chandler, in a statement provided to The Item last Friday, said the state “Public Employee Retirement Administration Commission and Boston EDIC (a Boston development agency overseen by BRA) have had different interpretations of the law. We disagree with PERAC’s findings but will address those issues at the appropriate time. Once a final determination is reached, I will abide by it.”