An amended version of Eastern’s voluntary tax-deferred retirement plan passed through the Board of Trustees Friday, including several changes to the program.

The IRS issued a set of changes to the plan, last amended in 1999, which included Roth contributions.

Paul McCann, the interim vice president for business affairs, said the plan was generally expanded to include the Roth contributions and eliminating the catch-up contributions.

The Roth (after-tax) contributions were not available originally when the plan was last amended. Now that they are, the board approved the amendment with its use.

Another change is in the form of eliminating the ability to make catch-up contributions within the plan. Employees, however, will still have the ability through the State of Illinois’s 457 Plan to make catch-up contributions.

“We have provided for those catch-up options through the 457,” McCann said.

McCann said at the present time there was only one employee using the catch-up contributions and even after the proposed change, the employee can make catch-up contributions to the State’s 457 plan.

McCann added that the option will still be available to the employees through the 457.

“We don’t believe there is any current harm coming to our employees,” he said.

Because of the complexities built into the plan under the new regulations, the board was also asked to consider the hiring of a third party to administer the plan. The board approved ADMIN Partners, in association with a custodial paying agent, Mid Atlantic Trust Company. ADMIN Partners will be sent the monies that the university collects from payroll checks and transmit it to the investment firms selected by the participants.

There is no change at the current time in the underlying investment firms.

The full document detailing the changes in the plan can be found at dailyeasternnews.com.

The board also approved the naming of university property. The family and consumer sciences and Klehm Hall Student Lounge is now named  the Esther Brothers Elmore ’40, Klehm Student Lounge.

The student lounge is named in honor of Jane Elmore, who received her bachelor’s degree in family and consumer sciences in 1972. Elmore worked as a social worker and in 1975 was appointed the executive director for Berwyn Cicero Council on Aging until 1977 when she became the legislative liaison for the Illinois Department on aging.

The name of the student lounge comes from Elmore’s mother, who was also a family and consumer sciences graduate in 1940.

The board will reconvene Jan. 23, 2015.

Bob Galuski can be reached at 581-2812 or deneic@gmail.com.