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New database: Who gets the highest pensions in NY?

More than 200 retired state workers earned $150,000 or more in retirement last year, a review of records shows.

ALBANY -- More than 200 retired state workers earned $150,000 or more in retirement last year, a review of records shows.

One doctor from Buffalo earned the most: Shashikant Lele, the chief of gynecologic oncology at Roswell Park, received $436,000 in a public pension.

Many of the top recipients are doctors at the state's public hospitals, but others were SUNY educators, retired police officers or executives with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

Peter Brower, who retired in 2015 as the police chief of Ramapo, Rockland County, ranked 10th with an annual pension of $229,266, records from the state Comptroller's Office showed.

DATABASE: STATE EMPLOYEES PENSIONS

Check the list: What state government workers earned in 2017

The top pensioners were the exception rather than the norm. The average pension for state workers in the Employees’ Retirement System, which includes local government workers, was $23,026 as of March 2017.

For state workers in the State Police and Fire Retirement System, the average pension was $49,123.

Limiting pensions

New York has sought to limit pension benefits for new workers, installing a new pension tier in 2012 that provides less lucrative payouts upon retirement and more payments into the system by the workers.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo has touted the change as helping the state balance its annual budget after state and local governments, as well as schools, dealt with rising pension costs.

He has estimated the new pension tier will save state and local governments more than $80 billion over 30 years, and it already has lowered costs by $1 billion in the current fiscal year, according to state budget documents.

"Overall pension costs are projected to remain relatively stable due to improved investment returns and ongoing savings from the 2012 pension reforms," the documents said.

Pension costs for municipalities have stayed fairly stable in recent years. The state's $192 billion pension fund is one of the largest in the nation.

DiNapoli announced last August that pension costs would drop slightly in the current fiscal year.

How are payouts determined?

An employee's pension is determined by three main factors: final average salary; the pension tier and the number of years of service.

The system has about 1 million active members and retirees.

The pensions paid out to lawmakers convicted of crimes has become criticized in recent years.

In 2011, the state Legislature and Cuomo adopted a law that gave a judge the authority to strip the retirement benefits for elected officials who took office after 2011.

But critics said the measure didn't go far enough.

So in a referendum in 2016, voters approved a change to the state constitution that allows a judge to strip an elected or appointed official's pension if they are convicted of a felony directly related to their job.

But the change only applies to crimes that were committed after Jan. 1, 2018.

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