N.J. Stat. tit. 43, ch. 18

in effect

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-1 Incorporation; purpose

The employees of the local board or department of health heretofore or hereafter established in any city may form a corporation for the purpose of providing and obtaining a fund to pension such employees.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-2 Procedure

For the purpose of forming such a corporation, the health officer or other chief officer or person in charge of such employees, shall notify every employee of the local board or department of health to attend a meeting to be held not less than five days after the giving of the notice, to consider the formation of a corporation in accordance with this chapter. The notice shall be in writing and specify the time and place of the meeting of the employees. If two-thirds of the employees present at the meeting vote in favor of forming the corporation they shall adopt a resolution to that effect and choose a name for the corporation. They shall organize by electing three persons selected from the employees of such board or department, who, together with the executive head of the board or department having charge or control of the public health in the city, and the health officer or other chief officer or person in charge of the employees, the latter two being ex-officio members, shall constitute a board of trustees. The first trustees created hereunder shall prepare and sign a certificate reciting the adoption of the resolution by the employees as hereinbefore directed, the name adopted, the appointment of trustees, the organization and the name of officers and execution of the certificate, for the purpose of forming a corporation under this chapter, for the purposes herein set forth, which certificate shall be recorded in the office of the clerk of the county wherein the corporation is organized, and filed in the office of the commissioner of banking and insurance, at Trenton. Thereupon such trustees, their associates and successors, shall be a corporation with all the powers incident thereto.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-3 Trustees; filling vacancy of trustee or officer; bond of trustee or officer

The first board of trustees, selected as provided in section 43:18-2 of this title, shall serve until the month of January following the incorporation of the association. At such time three members of the association shall be elected as trustees in place of the three selected as provided in said section 43:18-2, by a majority vote of the members of the association as follows: One for the term of one year, one for the term of two years and one for the term of three years, who shall serve for the respective terms for which they each were chosen. Thereafter annually, in the month of January in each year, a member of the board of trustees shall be chosen for a full term of three years to serve in the place of the trustee whose term shall have then expired, so that the term of office of only one member shall expire in each year. A vacancy occurring in any manner in the board of trustees or in the office of any officer of the corporation shall be filled in the manner provided for in the by-laws, and in the absence of such provision by the board of trustees. The trustees and officers of the corporation shall give bonds, with a duly authorized surety company as surety thereon, for the faithful performance of their duties in such sum or sums as the corporation's by-laws fix.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-4 Organization

The board of trustees shall, at the first annual meeting thereof, and at each annual meeting thereafter, elect a chairman, secretary, treasurer and any other officers it deems necessary. The secretary may be a member of the board, or the clerk of the local board or department of health. The board of trustees shall fix the compensation of the secretary and treasurer. The chairman shall serve without compensation.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-5 Payments; deposits; investments

All moneys paid out of the pension fund shall be paid by the treasurer of the corporation upon warrants signed by the chairman of the board of trustees and countersigned by the secretary thereof, and no warrant shall be drawn except by the order of the board upon a yea and nay vote recorded in the minutes of the board. The board of trustees may deposit the fund in any of the banks or trust companies of such cities, and may invest the same in bonds secured by first mortgages on improved property worth at least twice the amount loaned, or in bonds of the United States or of this state, or any city or county in this state. All income, interest or dividend which shall be paid or agreed to be paid on account of any loan or deposit shall belong to and constitute a part of the fund.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-6 Reports

The board of trustees shall make a semiannual report of the condition of the fund and the manner in which it is invested to the local board or department of health of the city, in the months of January and July in each year, and at such other times as it may be requested so to do by the local board or department.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-7 Membership

Except as hereinafter in this section provided the employees of any such local board or department of health who shall be entitled to accept the provisions of this chapter shall be the health officer or chief inspector employed by such board or department, all persons employed in the sanitary department of any such board, all persons regularly employed by any such board in the care of any tuberculosis or any other hospital which is or may be under the control of any such board, all persons actually engaged as physicians, nurses, or otherwise, in taking care of patients in any such tuberculosis or any other hospital, excepting visiting physicians not on the regular staff of any such hospital, and all persons employed in any dispensary or laboratory under the control and management of any such board, including chemists regularly employed by any such board; it being the intent of this paragraph to include under the provisions thereof all persons and employees on the payroll of any such department of health. Every employee or officer as above defined, appointed after June second, one thousand nine hundred and thirty-seven, shall automatically become a member of the pension fund corporation from the date of appointment for service in the health department or city hospital, providing such employee or officer has been passed by the corporation's physician as mentally and physically eligible for membership. No employee or officer who has attained the age of forty years, shall be eligible to become a member of such pension fund corporation. The terms of this chapter shall not serve to involuntarily enroll any employee eligible to membership who is already entitled by virtue of qualifying prior military service to pension benefits established by law for war veterans. All persons employed by any such board or department of health who are eligible to membership in the pension fund shall be permitted to take the immediate advantage of this chapter.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-8 Perjury

A person who shall willfully or knowingly swear falsely in an oath for the purpose of obtaining or procuring a pension or the payment thereof, under the provisions of this chapter shall be deemed guilty of perjury.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-9 Application for membership

Any employee of the board or department of health hereinbefore mentioned may avail himself of the benefits of the pension fund by applying in writing for membership therein and paying in the fund the monthly assessments levied by the board of trustees.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-10 Physical examination as prerequisite to membership

Any employee applying for membership in a corporation created under this chapter and the benefits thereof, must have passed, at the time he entered service, a physical examination satisfactory to and conducted by a physician designated by the board of trustees of the pension fund or shall pass a physical examination satisfactory to and conducted by such a physician at the time of his application for membership in the corporation and the benefits of this chapter. The applicant shall produce a certificate of good health signed by such a physician before being admitted to membership and the benefits of this chapter.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-11 Pension fund

The pension fund shall be created and sustained as follows: a. There shall be deducted from every payment of salary to each employee not less than four per cent and not more than six per cent of the amount thereof, as determined by the board of trustees, if such employee entered such service on or before the age of thirty-five years, and, if after such age, then such percentage shall be increased to such an amount as shall be determined by the board of trustees to correspond to the risk arising by the additional age of such employee. b. The city shall raise by taxation and pay into said fund yearly an amount equal to four per cent of the total salaries paid to such employees. c. All fines, if any, imposed on any employee, all fines and penalties, collected for the violation of any statute relating to the public health, or ordinance of the board of health, and all moneys deducted from the salary of any such employee on account of absence or loss of time. d. All moneys given or donated to such fund by any person or corporation in any manner or form whatsoever. In case there shall not be sufficient money in the pension fund created as aforesaid, the governing body shall include in any tax levy a sum sufficient to meet the requirements of such fund for the time being. The board of trustees of any such pension corporation may assess and collect from each and every employee of such board or department, who is a member of such pension corporation the per cent of his annual salary, as shall be determined by the board of trustees, to be paid semimonthly to the treasurer of such corporation, and such assessment and collection shall be in manner and form as may be provided in the by-laws of such corporation. The board of trustees is hereby empowered, in its judgment, to make it a condition of membership that each member shall sign an order on the city treasurer, or other disbursing officer, directing the retention of the amount of the assessment levied hereunder, to be paid over directly to such corporation by retention from his salary or wages, and the city treasurer or other disbursing officer is hereby directed to make such retention and payment; but such retention and payment shall only become operative in the event of the same being authorized by the by-laws of such corporation. The fund shall be under the control and management of the board of five trustees.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-12 Pension exempt from legal process

All pensions created under this chapter shall be exempt from execution, attachment or other legal process.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-13 Refunding dues paid upon death within five years, resignation or dismissal

On or after June fifth, one thousand nine hundred and thirty-six, if any person then a member, or thereafter or hereafter becoming a member of such pension corporation, having paid into such fund, shall die not having served five years as an employee or officer, or shall resign voluntarily or be dismissed from service or is transferred outside the jurisdiction of the fund, all dues paid by such person shall be refunded to him or her without interest.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-14 Application for retirement

An applicant for retirement shall apply therefor in writing to the board of trustees of the pension fund. The application shall be granted if it is acted upon favorably by a majority of the board and if all charges and dues against the applicant, as shown by the books of the fund, have been paid in full.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-15 Payment of pensions; retirement; death; incapacity

Pensions shall be paid from such fund in following manner: I. In all cities of this state in which this chapter is or shall hereafter become operative, every employee and officer, as defined in section 43:18-7 of this title, who shall have honorably served therein for twenty-five years continuously, and who is a member of said pension fund corporation, and who has paid all the dues and assessments levied and provided for by the statutes of New Jersey governing said corporation and the by-laws of said corporation, and who shall have attained the age of fifty-five years, shall upon application to the local board or department of health of such city, be retired by such board and shall thereupon receive from such pension fund, an amount, annually, equal to one-half of the average salary received by such employee, for the last two years of his or her employment; provided, however, that the retirement age of fifty-five years herein prescribed shall not retroactively affect the retirement age of any member employee who was a member of said pension fund corporation prior to June fifth, one thousand nine hundred and thirty-six. Whenever any employee or officer, having served a period of five years or over in the board or department of health or city hospital, who, having paid into the fund the full amount of his or her annual assessments, shall die or in the event that any member who has been heretofore, or who shall hereafter be retired and pensioned under the provisions of this chapter shall die, then and in each of such events, a pension in an amount equal to one-half the amount of the average salary received by such member during the last two years of his or her employment and in those cases where a member has been retired and pensioned previous thereto, shall be paid to the widow for the benefit of herself and minor children, if any, under the age of sixteen years, but in no case shall such payment exceed one thousand dollars per annum; provided, however, that in cities of the second class, in which on June second, one thousand nine hundred and thirty-seven, the act entitled "An act concerning local boards of health and employees thereof in cities in this state, and for the relief of such employees," approved April second, one thousand nine hundred and thirteen, as amended and supplemented, was in force, a pension in an amount equal to one-half of the amount of the average salary received by such member during the last two years of his or her employment shall be paid to the widow, but in no case shall the payment exceed the sum of two thousand dollars per annum. In the event a member shall die and leave a surviving husband who is incapacitated either mentally or physically and unable to pursue a gainful occupation for the care of himself and children, if there be any, such surviving husband shall be entitled to a pension of one-half the amount of the average salary received by such member, such pension not to exceed one thousand dollars annually. No pension shall be paid to any widow or widower of any member of the corporation unless he or she was married to a member of the corporation before the date of said member's retirement and before said member arrived at the age of fifty years. Upon the remarriage of any such widow or widower pension payments shall cease. In the event that there shall be no widow or widower surviving or qualified to take under this chapter, but such deceased member shall leave children surviving under the age of sixteen years then such pension shall be paid to such of said member's children who have not attained the age of sixteen years in equal shares if there are three or more of them; if only two they shall be paid twenty dollars each, monthly, and if only one, such child shall be paid twenty-five dollars monthly, until the age of sixteen years is reached. In no event shall the payment under this provision exceed the sum of one thousand dollars annually. II. The board of trustees of any pension fund corporation organized under this chapter are hereby authorized to pay to any member from such pension fund an amount equal to one-half of his or her average salary received by him or her for the last two years of his or her employment; provided, that any such employee or officer of such board or department shall hereafter become incapacitated, either mentally, or physically; provided, however, that no such payments shall be made unless the member has completed his or her fifth year of service in said board or department of health or city hospital. III. Any employee or officer of any such local board or department of health who shall have served therein for twenty-five years continuously, and who is a member of said pension fund corporation and who has paid all the dues and assessments levied and provided for by the statutes of New Jersey governing said corporation and the by-laws of said corporation, and who shall have attained the age of fifty-five years, who shall become incapacitated either mentally or physically from illness or injuries incurred in the performance of his duties as such employee, or who, by reason of advanced age is found unfit for the performance of his duties, shall be retired by the local board or department of health of such city and thereupon he shall receive from such pension fund an amount equal to one-half the average salary received by him for the last two years of his employment; provided, however, that the retirement age of fifty-five years herein prescribed shall not retroactively affect the retirement age of any member employee entered into and obtaining prior to June fifth, one thousand nine hundred and thirty-six.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-15.1 Pensions to widows in certain cases

The widow of any member of any pension fund corporation existing under the provisions of the chapter to which this act is a supplement shall be entitled to receive the pension provided for by section fifteen of said chapter, notwithstanding that her marriage to said member took place after said member reached the age of fifty years; provided, such marriage took place prior to March twenty-eighth, one thousand nine hundred and twenty-seven; and provided, further, that such member at the time of his death, was or shall be in good standing in said corporation. L.1938, c. 327, p. 838, s. 1.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-16 Dishonesty to bar benefit hereunder

Any employee of the board or department of health, included in the provisions of this chapter, who unlawfully retains any of the moneys, funds, properties or effects of a corporation organized under this chapter shall be forever debarred from receiving any relief or benefit from the pension fund.

N.J. Stat. § 43:18-17 Change in form of government not to affect corporation

In the event of a change in the method of government heretofore or hereafter adopted in any city in which a pension corporation has been incorporated under this chapter, the corporation shall not thereby become inoperative, but shall extend to and continue in force and effect in so far as the provisions of this chapter may be consistent with such change and rearrangement of the duties and positions of the members of the pension corporation. The provisions hereof shall apply to any new board, body or authority which shall be charged with the supervision of the department or departments under which the members of any such pension corporation are employed.

Source: Open US Law by Vaquill AI (CC BY 4.0)URL: https://www.njleg.state.nj.us/legislative-activity/statutesFetched: 10/17/2026