Ethics and Governance – Texas Pension Review Board

Governance

In basic terms, governance is the systems and process that comprise the oversight and control of an organization.^[1]At a minimum, good governance generally means decisions are made through processes that are:

consistent and well-documented;
in compliance with relevant statutes and rules;
and open and accountable to stakeholders.

For public retirement systems, good governance also means fiduciaries exercise their duties including prudently selecting and managing investments and cost-effectively administering the system.

The Texas Pension Review Board has created a table showing the contribution and benefit decision-making provisions for public retirement systems. Click here to view the table.

Ethics

Trustees and administrators of public retirement systems must follow the highest professional and ethical standards to help ensure that assets are safeguarded, promised benefits are delivered and decision-making is fair and equitable. As fiduciaries, trustees and key employees have a legal duty to ensure that certain standards of conduct are met.

Model Ethical Standards and Conflict-of-Interest Policies

Pursuant to Section 801.210 of the Texas Government Code, the State Pension Review Board (PRB) has developed the following Model Ethics and Conflict-of-Interest Policy for voluntary use by Texas public retirement systems.

Model Ethics and Conflict-of-Interest Policy

Sample Retirement Systems Ethics Policies

Here are some sample of ethics policies adopted by Texas public retirement systems.

Texas Statutes

The following statutes contain many of the ethical standards and conflict-of-interest and disclosure requirements that may apply to Texas public retirement systems.

^[1] NASRA Governance Overview