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Rush & Wolf

v. State of Washington
"Rush II"

King County Superior Court

Civil Case No. 21-2-04314-0

Part-Time Community and Technical College
Instructors Denied Retirement Benefits

Part-time Washington community and technical college employees averaging half-time work are eligible for supplemental retirement benefits under the State Board Retirement Plan.  Mader v. State of Washington, King County Superior Court No. 98-2-30850-8.  The State has wrongly denied participants both contributions and years of service.

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Named Plaintiff Dana Rush has worked half-time or more as a part-time Washington community college instructor since 1991.  He, and other community and technical college academic employees like him, obtained the right to participate in the State Board's Retirement Plan through the Mader litigation.  But when it came time for him to retire, the State failed to provide the retirement benefits he was owed.

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Named plaintiff Gary Wolf worked half-time or more as a part-time Washington community college instructor for over 15 years.  Under the State Board's Retirement Plan, employees are eligible for a supplemental defined benefit calculation when they have "ten or more years of service."  But the State Board denied his application for a benefit calculation, claiming the eligibility requirement was ten years of continuous service.

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Recently, King County Superior Court Judge Cindi Port granted plaintiffs' motion for partial summary judgment on one issue, finding that the plain language of the plan terms requires only "ten or more years of service" to be eligible for a supplemental benefit calculation, whether or not that service is continuous.  Read the court order in the Case Documents section below.

Case History

Originally established through regulations in 1969, the State Board Retirement Plan was adopted as a written plan document in 1998.  The State Board Retirement Plan offers eligible participants both a defined contribution plan and a supplemental defined benefit plan.  In 2002, as a result of the Mader litigation, thousands of part-time Washington community and technical college employees averaging half-time work obtained eligibility for retirement benefits under the plan.  As a part of the settlement, Mader class members received TIAA contributions retroactive to the fall of 1990.  The State, however, continues to improperly deny supplemental retirement benefits to part-time community and technical college employees.

Named plaintiff Gary Wolf filed suit against the State of Washington in 2019 in Thurston County, seeking relief from the State Board's denial of his application for a supplemental retirement benefit eligibility calculation.

Class representative Dana Rush later filed suit in King County against the State on behalf of all part-time state community and technical college academic employees who were erroneously denied retirement benefits.

The cases were consolidated in King County, and the complaint was amended to encompass four separate issues impacting Mr. Wolf, Mr. Rush, and class members like them:

(1) The State failed to credit the retroactive TIAA contributions awarded in the Mader settlement.

(2) The State failed to use the statutorily required method of calculating Full-Time Equivalency.

(3) The State wrongfully required participants to re-establish eligibility after a break in service.

(4) The State wrongfully interpreted the supplemental defined calculation eligibility requirements as requiring ten "continuous" years of service.  This affects only the supplemental defined benefit portion of the plan.

Recently, King County Superior Court Judge Cindi Port granted plaintiffs' motion for partial summary judgment on liability, finding that the plain language of the plan terms requires only "ten or more years of service," and rejecting the State's interpretation that participants must have ten continuous years of service to be eligible for the supplemental defined benefit calculation.



This webpage will be updated with information as the case progresses.  Please check back periodically for updates.

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