BISMARCK — Nearly two dozen retired county employees across North Dakota will keep receiving their pensions, following a decision by the North Dakota Public Employees Retirement System Board on Tuesday, May 13.

Some retirees serving as elected county officials had their pension payments suspended earlier this year after federal regulators flagged a tax oversight. The issue involved officials who returned to county service after retirement and were allowed to opt out of contributing to the pension system — a violation of a 2007 change in federal tax code.

Among those affected was Grand Forks County Commissioner Bob Rost, who initially resigned when his pension was halted, saying he couldn’t live on his $22,000 annual salary as a commissioner.

“To me this is a no-brainer,” said Mike Seminary, NDPERS board chairman.

So far, 20 officials self-reported the conflict. In April, the Grand Forks County Commission reluctantly wrote a $20,000 check to PERS, covering the county and employee contributions that should have been made since Rost was elected six years ago. That payment will now be refunded.

“This would allow current elected county officials who are receiving retirement benefits to not have to repay the overpayment of benefits and this would eliminate the need for employers to make retroactive contributions back,” Seminary said.

The board has established a sunset clause for this decision, effective through Aug. 1, 2027. Until then, PERS staff and lawmakers are expected to develop a permanent solution.

“You can’t make a salary based on your elected earnings, so we count on those retired people to come over to county government and participate as a county commissioner,” said Aaron Birst, executive director of the North Dakota Association of Counties.

The PERS board plans to hold a special meeting next week to begin outlining future changes.

Matt Henson is an Emmy award-winning reporter/photographer/editor for WDAY. Prior to joining WDAY in 2019, Matt was the main anchor at WDAZ in Grand Forks for four years.

BISMARCK — Bryon Rosene is in his ninth year as a paraprofessional in the Elgin-New Leipzig Public School system, and was, until recently, an AmeriCorps participant.

Sweeping cuts of around $400 million in grants by the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency on April 25 ended Rosene’s work and that of dozens of other AmeriCorps members across the state.

AmeriCorps participants in North Dakota primarily worked in schools, child care and community- capacity building in rural parts of the state where recruiting extra assistance can prove challenging.

Besides his regular duties, being part of AmeriCorps allowed Rosene to work closely with 10 of the school’s seventh and eighth-grade students. This is done during a structured period outside normal class time dedicated to improving math scores that had slipped following the pandemic.

While that number may not sound like a lot, for a school with only 160 students from K-12, Rosene said was able to serve a significant portion that needed extra help through his AmeriCorps participation.

“There’s an absolute improvement, the quality of work, the quality of thinking,” Rosene said.

“Everything with it has been beneficial to them.”

Rosene was somewhat skeptical about joining the AmeriCorps program initially, he said, but saw how well it worked after becoming involved.

“Some federal programs get thrown out there and don’t stand up to the test of time, but this one, it stands up, and it has the data to prove it,” Rosene said. “The program works, and it’s kind of a shame to see it cut.”

AmeriCorps was formed under the National and Community Service Trust Act of 1993, but has roots in similar federal programs spanning back to President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps of 1933.

Its direct forerunner was the Volunteers in Service of America program that sprang from the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964.

Participants are often students or recent graduates and qualify for awards to cover education costs, loans or student loan deferments, the latter of which Rosene was able to take. Older volunteers get stipends and supplemental health insurance, or apply educational savings costs to younger family members.

Elgin-New Leipzig Public School superintendent Sherlock Hirning said the school system had three paraprofessionals who participated in the AmeriCorps program who won’t be able to continue providing those services outside of their regular employment.

One was focused on K-3 reading, another on K-6 math, and Rosene who worked with older middle school kids on math.

Three North Dakota programs receiving federal grants in the state were affected, including the South East Education Cooperative (SEEC), Cooperstown Community Activities Authority (CCAA) and the Souris Basin Planning Council (SBPC), which had two grants.

Grant terminations impacted 84 slots for AmeriCorps participants facilitated by the state’s Department of Commerce and the state service commission, Serve ND. Another nine slots were cut under an SBPC program directly paid out by the federal AmeriCorps Agency.

While the total grant amount was expected to be around $432,000 for all the programs cut, some did not use all the funding.

For example, the North Dakota Professional Corps that Rosene took part in was allotted over $24,000 for 40 participants.

This program ended up only recruiting 11 paraprofessionals at rural schools across the state and costing an estimated $7,000 in grant funding total, said Kerri Whipple, director of literary services at SEEC.

Direct AmeriCorps Agency funding for 187 other participants across the state is not currently impacted. This includes another SEEC Reading and Math Corps group, and programs operated by Strengthen ND and Jamestown Parks and Recreation.

Other than some of the minimal material costs covered by AmeriCorps, the salaries of the paraprofessionals were already being covered by the Elgin-New Leipzig school district, Hirning said.

“They kept the one that’s costing them money and cut the one that doesn’t cost them any money that the district is already paying for,” Hirning said. “Now how is that in the vein of saving the billions of dollars they claim they’re saving by doing this whole thing across the country make any sense?”

Whipple was also confused by the cuts.

“The one that is most cost-effective is the one they cut,” Whipple said, echoing Superintendent Hirning. “There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to who got cut, who got cut partially,

who got cut completely, who was left alone.”

The SEEC program that was cut and that Rosene participated in was especially important for small rural communities, Whipple said. It allowed schools to already use hired staff at the school instead of trying to tap into a limited pool of candidates available in many communities.

“There’s not a lot of people sitting around hoping for volunteer opportunities that aren’t already engaged somewhere,” Whipple said of the situation in smaller towns.

The cuts are particularly devastating to the community of Cooperstown, where the CCAA lost six AmeriCorps participants as well as the ability to work with a pool of dozens of other AmeriCorp-leveraged volunteers in the community.

The AmeriCorps members the CCAA facilitated served in after-school programs, in a community daycare, and at a community gym program.

For these positions under the Kidz Count AmeriCorps Program, federal funding covered around two-thirds of the cost, with local funding picking up the rest.

“We’ve been able to get these programs to run because no one has the funding to have these

services themselves,” said Michelle Zaun, who ran the Kidz Count program.

“The daycares that my members worked in with younger children who are developmentally behind, who are socially behind, no one can pay for the services themselves,” Zaun said. “Our community is small, there’s not enough funding to provide these services.”

CCAA had slots for 10 participants and had been looking to bring on more, but finding people is a challenge as is making sure they pass background checks, Zaun said.

The other organization impacted, Souris Basin Planning Council, had two grants canceled. One grant came directly from the federal government and the other federal grant was facilitated by the Department of Commerce and Serve ND.

In a statement, SBPC’s executive director Briselda Hernandez said the organization was “deeply troubled by the abrupt notice” of the funding cuts.

The SBPC lost grants for over $263,000 to cover 33 AmeriCorps participant slots.

Hernandez stated that SBPC supported nonprofit and community capacity-building efforts statewide by deploying AmeriCorps participants. Briselda got her start after college as an AmeriCorps VISTA participant herself.

“That year of service deepened my commitment to public service, inspiring me to pursue a master’s in public administration and dedicate my career to economic and community development in North Dakota,” Briselda said.

The future of other AmeriCorps programs is also uncertain.

A reported 75% of AmeriCorps Agency staff were placed on leave in the late April efficiency orders, leading some to believe deeper cuts are coming.

“We typically know about next year in March or April, and we haven’t heard anything,” Whipple said about the continuation of other programs past this year.

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