Lansing Police & Fire Retirement System

Lansing Police & Fire Retirement System

The Lansing Police & Fire Retirement System operates as an independent municipal pension fund within Michigan's web of locally administered retirement plans, serving the specific beneficiary pool of the city's police officers and firefighters. Governed by a board of trustees that includes departmental representatives, the mayor, and the city's CFO, the fund's governance blends operational proximity to the workforce with the City of Lansing's broader fiscal oversight. The system pays retirement, disability, and survivor benefits, and its financial health is reported annually in actuarial valuations filed with the State of Michigan. The fund's investment strategy is conservative by design, reflecting the liability stream it must service. Asset allocation typically spans domestic and international equities, core fixed income, and an allocation to real assets — real estate and infrastructure — that provides an inflation hedge and income component. While specific manager lineups and direct co-investments are not publicly detailed in a consolidated window, the system participates alongside other Michigan municipal plans in MAPERS (Michigan Association of Public Employee Retirement Systems), which facilitates manager education and potential economies of scale for smaller pools of capital. Its geographic exposure is centered in the United States, with global diversification achieved through commingled fund vehicles. Brad St. Aubin and Eric Wohlfert serve as Chair and Vice-Chair, respectively, each representing the departments whose members depend on the system's solvency. The board also includes Lansing Mayor Andy Schor and City CFO Crystal Thomas, embedding city-level financial oversight directly into the retirement system's governance. The fund participates in NCPERS (National Conference on Public Employee Retirement Systems), a national association that provides benchmarking, fiduciary training, and legislative advocacy for public plans. April 2024: The City of Lansing released its annual actuarial valuation, updating the funded ratio and employer contribution rates for the Police & Fire plan as part of the city's regular fiscal reporting cycle. The system's defining structural characteristic is its statutory isolation: as a closed plan for two specific uniformed departments, it operates with a narrower beneficiary base and a more predictable liability profile than a city-wide general employees' plan. This separation in Michigan's public retirement architecture means its discount rate, amortization policy, and benefit tiers are subject to distinct state legislative mandates — a governance constraint that external asset managers and co-investors should recognize as non-negotiable boundary conditions for the fund's investment policy.