About Us

The National Coordinating Committee for Multiemployer Plans (NCCMP) is a non-partisan, non-profit membership organization founded in 1974 after the enactment of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (“ERISA”). NCCMP is the only national organization that advocates before Congress, the Administration, the regulatory agencies and the Courts on behalf of multiemployer retirement and health plans. Multiemployer retirement plans have approximately $500 billion in assets.

The NCCMP represents multiemployer plans, employers and sponsoring unions, and plan professionals. We are dedicated exclusively to the advocacy and strengthening of multiemployer plans, their employer and labor sponsors, participants and beneficiaries, and the multiemployer system as a whole. Together, we have achieved an unparalleled track record of results. The NCCMP is widely respected and recognized as the voice of the multiemployer community.

Over the past four decades, the NCCMP’s mission has remained constant: to assure an environment in which multiemployer benefit plans can continue in their vital role of providing retirement security and health and welfare benefits to current and former working Americans and their families through negotiated benefits with a minimum of regulatory or other interference.

The NCCMP proactively engages with Congress, the Administration, and the various regulatory agencies, and the Courts to advocate for the interests of multiemployer plans, sponsors, and participants. The NCCMP recognizes the varied and diverse features of the multifaceted benefit plans that make up the multiemployer system, and when innovative approaches to developing challenges are required, the NCCMP actively engages the community to respond. The NCCMP also monitors, on a non-partisan basis, legislative, regulatory and legal developments from conception to implementation to enforcement. In every instance, the NCCMP strives to ensure that the interests of all members are reflected at every step of the way.

Any time changes to laws or regulations affecting multiemployer plans are proposed or enacted your plans are directly impacted. The NCCMP is actively engaged in the development of laws and regulations, whether by bringing the need for change to policy makers, or by being the “go-to” organization for Congress and the regulatory community. By communicating with government officials, members of Congress and staff about the unique characteristics of multiemployer plans, the NCCMP has saved multiemployer plans hundreds of millions of dollars in regulatory and administrative costs. Moreover, by actively engaging the system, the NCCMP has successfully educated and persuaded legislators and rule makers to take the needs of multiemployer plans into consideration in framing the regulatory system under which our plans must operate.

The NCCMP maintains a strong presence on Capitol Hill. We have developed long-standing relationships with members of Congress, their staffs and the committees of jurisdiction over employee benefit plans. The NCCMP regularly testifies at congressional hearings, prepares written comments on legislative proposals, advises committee staff, supports positive legislation, proposes or seeks change to legislation that could adversely affect our member plans and actively opposes legislative proposals that would clearly harm our plans or participants. The NCCMP has also undertaken activities to initiate needed legislation when such actions were determined to be in the best interests of the plans, their participants and sponsoring organizations. NCCMP influences virtually every piece of employee benefit legislation for the benefit of multiemployer plans and their participants.

The most notable legislative successes in the past decade include NCCMP’s role as the major facilitator and coordinator of representatives from more than 40 organizations comprising a broad cross-section of the stakeholders within the multiemployer community known as the “Retirement Security Review Commission.” In early 2013, the Commission concluded an eighteen month-long process that produced a comprehensive set of reform recommendations aimed at preserving long-term retirement security for workers while reducing or eliminating unacceptable financial risks for contributing employers in Solutions Not Bailouts.

Solutions Not Bailouts prescribed three broad categories of recommendations – Preservation, Remediation, and Innovation. Preservation included technical enhancements to the Pension Protection Act of 2006 (PPA) to strengthen plans that have regained financial stability following the catastrophic market collapse of 2008, and to help other plans on the path to recovery. Remediation was designed to preserve plans headed for insolvency and benefits for participants above the levels payable if the plan were to become insolvent and subject to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation guaranty. Finally, innovation was intended to encourage new plan designs to improve benefit security by removing disincentives for current employers to remain in the system and for new employers to join.

The first two categories of recommendations were incorporated into the Multiemployer Pension Reform Act of 2014 (MPRA). The NCCMP is currently working to ensure the passage of the final recommendation to encourage new and innovative plan designs such as the Composite Plan.

The NCCMP’s legislative activities are not limited to pension issues. During the health care legislative process NCCMP representatives were actively engaged throughout the legislative process to raise concerns regarding the way multiemployer plans were to be addressed with the advent of comprehensive reform. Unfortunately, enactment of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA) did not follow the usual legislative process resulting in legislation that was less than desirable in many ways.

As the new Administration and Congress work to repeal and replace the ACA, the NCCMP continues to advocate on behalf of the multiemployer community so that the needs of multiemployer plans are taken into consideration.

The NCCMP is actively engaged with federal administrative agencies including the Department of Labor, the Internal Revenue Service, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, Health and Human Services, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the General Accountability Office as they develop and implement regulations affecting multiemployer benefit plans. Through regular formal and informal discussions, meetings, testimony and written submissions, the NCCMP provides agency officials with your unique perspective.   On request, we have also provided training assistance to federal agencies to help them better understand the nature and operations of our plans. More directly, the NCCMP files and coordinates the filing of comments with federal agencies on all significant proposed regulations, Notices of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) or Requests for Information.

The court system makes some of the most important decisions involving multiemployer plans – and the NCCMP is there. The NCCMP participates by submitting amicus curiae (or “friend of the court”) briefs in virtually all Supreme Court cases affecting multiemployer plans and in many precedent-setting courts of appeals cases. When a decision is not favorable to our members, the NCCMP is prepared to seek a legislative remedy.

The NCCMP has a voluntary board of directors representing plans, employers, and unions selected for their involvement with and commitment to multiemployer plans. In addition, the Board has created a Steering Committee comprised of a cross-section of our Contributing and Sustaining members to provide immediate feedback and direction on ongoing matters of a more technical nature that affect the membership. The NCCMP professional staff and consultants form the nucleus of the NCCMP Working Committee, which includes attorneys, actuaries, benefits experts, and legislative representatives with vast multiemployer plan experience who perform the day-to-day work of the organization.

The NCCMP has several membership categories under which plans, their sponsoring organizations and professional advisors may join. International Unions and National Employer Associations may join as Contributing Members. National and Large Regional plans that wish to have a more active role in the direction of the NCCMP may join as Sustaining Members. Contributing and/or Sustaining membership status is required for participation on the NCCMP Board of Directors and Steering Committee. Regular membership is available to all other local, regional, district council, and national multiemployer plans, local unions, local employer associations, and individual companies that sponsor multiemployer plans. Dues for regular members are determined by the size of the group. One membership can cover all benefit plans sponsored by the same participants.

Associate membership is available to fund professionals (including investment managers, consultants, accountants, actuaries, attorneys, administrators, and other service providers) who support the goals and activities of the NCCMP and wish to be associated with the NCCMP as an indication of their commitment to the multiemployer marketplace. Associate members will receive all publications, Multi-Elerts, NCCMP Annual Conference Benefits, and invitations to other NCCMP events.

The NCCMP members, plans, and contributing employers represent every major segment of the economy, including airlines, agriculture, building and construction, bakery and confectionary, entertainment, healthcare, hospitality, longshore, manufacturing, mining, retail, and wholesale food, service, sports, steel, and trucking industries.

The NCCMP depends on membership dues for its program income.

ABSOLUTELY – The International Foundation and the NCCMP each serve important, but quite different purposes. The International Foundation is an educational organization chartered under §501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, serving all types of employee benefit plans (corporate, public, and multiemployer). It is prohibited by its own tax status from advocating or promoting legislation or regulations on behalf any particular group or viewpoint.

Conversely, the NCCMP is the only organization specifically created to act as an advocate on behalf of multiemployer plans. It is organized as a social welfare organization chartered under §501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code. Therefore it can and does function as your “voice” before Congress and the regulatory agencies with jurisdiction over our plans – to influence, from your point of view, the creation of laws and regulations that will govern multiemployer plans before they become a reality.

The NCCMP also educates members on cutting-edge policy issues that specifically affect multiemployer plans, including plan fiduciaries, settlors, professional advisors, and participants. The NCCMP conducts an annual educational conference focused solely on multiemployer plan issues, publishes Multi-Elerts and other multiemployer focused publications, and holds meetings for professional advisors directly with key staff and agency officials on topics affecting multiemployer plans.

Plans, plan sponsors, and fund professionals interested in membership can obtain a membership application on our website at www.nccmp.org or make their request in writing to the NCCMP at the address shown below.

In addition to ensuring that your voice is heard, NCCMP membership enables your plan trustees, administrators and professionals to receive NCCMP publications, educational/advisory materials and discount registration fees for the annual NCCMP Conference. It also provides an opportunity to participate in the annual NCCMP Lawyers and Administrators Meeting, as well as the annual Transatlantic Conference.

Yes. Membership in the NCCMP is a legitimate expenditure for a tax-exempt employee benefit fund. This opinion has been upheld by the Department of Labor during the course of a plan investigation which raised that specific question. Of course, each plan should check with its own professional advisors for a formal opinion regarding any matter requiring a legal interpretation.

Sign up for our Multi-Elerts at the bottom of the page! The NCCMP sends periodic newsletters to keep our members up to date on breaking developments, issues, and legislation of interest to multiemployer plan sponsors and professionals, as well as the efforts of the NCCMP on behalf of the multiemployer community.

The NCCMP offices are located at 815 16th Street, N.W., Washington, DC, 20006. Please direct questions via email to the attention of Michael Scott, Executive Director at mscott@nccmp.org. Questions pertaining to membership dues or conference registration should be directed to the attention of Kelly Ahl-Rothfield, Director of Membership Services, at the above mailing address, or by e-mail to nccmp@nccmp.org. You can also reach the NCCMP by telephone at (202) 737-5315, or by fax at (202) 737-1308.