Amy Fecher, the secretary of the Arkansas Department of Transformation and Shared Services, will become executive director of the Arkansas Public Employees Retirement System starting July 1.
Fecher’s starting annual salary as the system’s director will be $165,396. As secretary of the state Department of Transformation and Shared Services, Fecher’s salary is $167,081.62 a year, according to the Arkansas Transparency website.
The salary range for the system executive director’s job is $149,862 to $181,500, according to the job description. Former system Executive Director Duncan Baird’s salary was $165,396 a year when he departed the system.
In a voice vote, the trustees on Wednesday selected Fecher over System Chief Investment Officer Carlos Borromeo, state treasurer’s office Senior Investment Manager Steve Pulley, and Kent Myers, a former Hot Springs city manager who is now the city manager of Fredericksburg, Texas.
The trustees’ action came after the system’s 13 trustees interviewed the four candidates in a closed-door executive session over four and a half hours.
Trustee Larry Walther, secretary of state Department of Finance and Administration, made the motion to hire Fecher as the system’s new director and trustee Daryl Bassett, secretary of the state Department of Labor and Licensing, seconded the motion.
Afterward, board Chairwoman Candace Franks, who is the state’s retired bank commissioner, said “the board felt like that Miss Fecher had the attributes that we need for our next executive director, particularly with her ability to work with the Legislature and also her experience in state government.
“The board felt like that she would be our best candidate,” she said.
At least a few trustees could be heard dissenting from the trustees’ voice vote to hire Fecher, though it wasn’t immediately clear how many dissented.
Afterward, two trustees said that they had dissented: state Auditor Andrea Lea and Richard Wilson, the retired assistant director of research at the Bureau of Legislative Research.
Lea said Fecher lacked the required financial expertise to be the system’s director, and Wilson said he didn’t feel that Fecher met the technical requirement of having a bachelor’s degree in business administration, accounting, finance economics, public administration or a related field.
Franks said the committee decided that Fecher’s experience “met the requirements as far as what we are looking at going forward.”
Fecher has a bachelor’s degree in physical science from the University of Central Arkansas, said Alex Johnson, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Transformation and Shared Services.
The minimum education and/or experience for the job includes a bachelor’s degree in business administration, accounting, finance economics, public administration or a related field and five years of executive experience reporting directly to corporate or public leadership, including three years in a supervisory or managerial capacity, according to the job description for the job.
Gov. Asa Hutchinson said in a written statement that “I congratulate Secretary Fetcher for her selection.
"She has led my administration efforts in transformation and she will do an excellent job leading the public employees retirement agency," the Republican governor said. "This was a decision made by the board independently and I applaud their diligence in the selection process. I have not yet made any decision on who will lead [the Department of Transformation and Shared Services].”