UFCW Local One Pension Fund

UFCW Local One Pension Fund

Founded in 1963, the UFCW Local One Pension Fund originated as the retirement vehicle for unionized workers in New York's supermarket and food-processing sectors. Frank C. DeRiso, president of UFCW District Union Local One, chairs the Board of Trustees alongside Co-Chairman Raymond Wardynski. The fund operates from Oriskany, New York, and is structurally tied to the UFCW Local One Health Care Fund, which separately administers health benefits for the same member base. The DeRiso family's union influence extends further: Frank DeRiso serves as an International Vice President of the UFCW, while his daughter Samantha leads the Central New York Labor Council. The fund covers members employed by contributing companies including Silgan Holdings and the now-bankrupt Tops Friendly Markets chain. The plan deploys assets across government bonds, real estate debt, multifamily real estate holdings, secondaries, and growth-oriented investments. Its United States real estate portfolio includes a mixed-use fund and a multifamily debt portfolio. A defining stress event was the bankruptcy of Tops Friendly Markets, a major contributing employer, which generated bankruptcy claims held as fund assets and contributed to the plan's underfunding. To stabilize its position, the fund secured Special Financial Assistance under the American Rescue Plan Act — a federal bailout program for troubled multiemployer pensions. The plan also maintains long-term withdrawal-liability obligations from Silgan Holdings running through 2042, reflecting an ongoing relationship with a solvent manufacturing contributor. Headcount is undisclosed, though key operational leadership includes Fund Director Michael Ciancaglini. He manages plan administration and also serves on the board of the New York Labor Health Care Alliance, embedding the fund within the state's labor-healthcare governance network. The fund's sponsor, UFCW District Union Local One, connects it to federations including the AFL-CIO and Change to Win. In May 2024, the fund concluded its annual charity golf classic through The One Charity Golf Classic Inc., an affiliated philanthropic entity that reinforces community ties among contributing employers and union leadership. The fund's structural differentiator lies in its hybrid asset base: a traditional multiemployer pension portfolio layered with distressed claims from the Tops Markets bankruptcy and long-duration withdrawal-liability receivables from Silgan Holdings. This balance-sheet composition transforms it from a plain defined-benefit plan into an entity carrying bankruptcy-recovery exposure and manufacturing-sector counterparty risk, under a governance model tightly held by the DeRiso family's union apparatus and sustained by federal solvency support.