UPPER MIDWEST PENSION RIGHTS PROJECT -
Iowa Legal Aid, a key partner in the Upper Midwest Pension Rights Project since the initial award of the grant in 2007, will assume the position of lead grantee during this third and final year of the project. The Upper Midwest Pension Rights Project will continue its goal of providing quality, comprehensive pension counseling, information, and referral through a coordinated, regional service model to the states of Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. The collaborative partnership involving Iowa Legal Aid, the Metropolitan Area Agency on Aging (Minneapolis, Minnesota), Legal Services of North Dakota, and the University of South Dakota Elder Law Forum, will focus on the following objectives and activities: 1) to deliver pension counseling services, including detailed legal analysis of claim viability, assist with survivor benefit and former spouse pension issues, draft claims and appeals, conduct lost pension searches and refer to employee benefits professionals, legal aid, and law school clinics; 2) to conduct outreach activities that will include intake and referral through partnerships with the Aging and Disability Resource Centers, Area Agencies on Aging, Legal Services, and Social Security field offices, as well as a targeted initiative to labor, rural, and immigrant communities; and 3) to increase operational efficiency by identifying, sharing and implementing effective pension counseling practices, and to collect and report on project and client outcome data, consistent with the overall Administration on Aging Pension Counseling Program. Expected project outcomes and products include an increase in overall economic self-sufficiency of retirees served, heightened consumer awareness of pension counseling, information and referral services, increased efficiency and improved project outcome data, semester and final reports, and a restoration of legal rights to pension benefits by participants who can least afford it.
