Two top leaders at Iowa’s largest public pension system are out following a misconduct investigation.
CEO Greg Samorajski resigned May 1, while Iowa Public Employees’ Retirement System officials fired Chief Benefits Officer Steven Herbert on Thursday, May 7, spokespeople for Gov. Kim Reynolds and the pension system announced.
The departures come about five weeks after the governor and pensions officials suspended the leaders, though spokespeople for both offices have declined to share details about the complaints against the executives.
The moves leave holes atop a system that, as of the end of last year, oversaw about $48 billion in assets for about 424,000 current and former state government, local government and public school employees.
Reynolds and IPERS officials have said repeatedly that the problems raised in complaints about Samorajski and Herbert did not expose risks to the system’s trust fund. But they wouldn’t detail the reasons behind the suspensions.
“Benefit payments to our members are not impacted,” IPERS spokesperson Rachel Simon said in an email Thursday.
Simon did not answer questions from the Des Moines Register about what Iowa Department of Administrative Services investigators found while looking into Samorajski and Herbert over the last month.
A spokesperson for the governor and DAS, which provides human resources services for other state agencies, did not return messages seeking comment Thursday.
Samorajski and Herbert also did not return calls seeking comment. Herbert previously told the Register an IPERS official told him he would be fired if he commented on the investigation.
Elizabeth Hennessey, an IPERS attorney who has served as interim CEO since Samorajski’s March 31 suspension, will continue to run the pension system while DAS officials search for a new executive. IPERS officials will search for a new chief benefits officer, Simon said.
Reynolds hired Samorajski in 2020 from Alaska, where he served as a deputy commissioner in that state’s revenue department. Samorajski earned about $252,000 in the fiscal year that ended June 30.
Samorajski hired Herbert, a former co-worker of his at Alaska-based McKinley Capital Management, last spring.
State Treasurer Roby Smith, a Republican and member of the IPERS Investment Board, said he was informed May 7 of Samorajski’s decision to resign.
“The Board will support the governor and Department of Administrative Services on their nationwide search for the next IPERS CEO,” Smith said in a statement. “IPERS represents a commitment to Iowa’s public employees that must be protected. My focus remains on maintaining the long-term strength of the system for current and future retirees.”
State Sen. Mark Lofgren, R-Muscatine, another member of the IPERS Investment Board, said Thursday he has not been informed about the details of the allegations against Samorajski and Herbert. He said DAS Director Mark Campbell met with board members in a private meeting a couple of weeks ago.
“To tell you the truth,” Lofgren recalled, “it was a very general meeting. Not a whole lot was said. All we knew was they were doing an investigation.”
State Rep. Elizabeth Wilson, D-Marion, who also sits on the IPERS Investment Board, said in a statement that the personnel problem doesn’t affect the fund’s stability and that she will push for more information to be released.
“Enough detail has to come out for people to be reassured of the protection of this fund,” she said in an interview. “So absolutely I believe that those details will come out. I have complete faith and will push for that to happen. But I don’t think I’ll have to push because I believe it will happen.”
Other board members declined to comment Thursday.
Herbert previously worked as chief investment officer at the Kentucky Public Pensions Authority, lasting 17 months before that system’s executive director fired him in May 2022.
Herbert filed a whistleblower lawsuit against the Kentucky system after his termination, but a judge dismissed the case in December 2024 — four months before IPERS hired Herbert.
In a deposition as part of that court case, the KPPA executive director said he fired Herbert for “myriad” reasons, adding that Herbert was “rude, condescending, abrupt” and “failed to work with other departments when he should.”
In previous interviews with the Register, members of the IPERS Benefits Advisory Committee said they knew KPPA fired Herbert and that he had filed a lawsuit. They said they did not review the court filings in the case, which are publicly available. They said the decision to hire him was solely Samorajski’s.
Tyler Jett is an investigative reporter for the Des Moines Register. Reach him at tjett@registermedia.com, 515-284-8215, or on X at @LetsJett. He also accepts encrypted messages at tjett@proton.me.
Stephen Gruber-Miller is the Capitol bureau chief for the Des Moines Register. He covers the Iowa Statehouse, the governor’s office and political campaigns. He can be reached by email at sgrubermil@registermedia.com, by phone at 515-284-8169 or on X at @sgrubermiller.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: IPERS CEO Greg Samorajski and chief benefits officer out after probe
Reporting by Stephen Gruber-Miller and Tyler Jett, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
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