NATCHEZ — Adams County will need to seek legislative approval in order to resolve the issue of unpaid retirement benefits for employees of the former Natchez Regional Medical Center.

Board of Supervisors President Darryl Grennell said he found out Friday the necessary arrangement will require local and private legislation for the county to pay any benefits on behalf of the now defunct county hospital.

The facility has since been sold to new ownership and is operating as Merit Health Natchez.

Board Attorney Scott Slover said the legislation would be necessary because even though the county owned the hospital at the time of its 2014 bankruptcy and subsequent sale, the two bodies are considered separate political subdivisions.

“The county enacted and created the hospital’s board of trustees — and (the trustees) were in charge of the employees — but the two entities were different, which is why the county is not liable for any of the bankruptcy claims,” Slover said.

The issue at hand — unpaid Public Employee Retirement System benefits for employees of the hospital — is one of the lingering fallouts from the hospital’s bankruptcy.

From November 2013 until the hospital filed for bankruptcy the following March, the hospital did not remit the employer portion of retirement payments even while employee payments were collected and sent. Under the PERS system, employers make a 15 percent match to employee contributions.

PERS has maintained that employee payments cannot  be posted without the employer match, meaning those months have not yet been counted toward the employees’ total retirement.

The non-payments of  PERS benefits continued after the bankruptcy filing, but the post-petition claims were paid when the bankruptcy court approved the plan that included the ultimate sale of the hospital.

Members of the board of supervisors have expressed a willingness to help employees receive their retirement benefits, and Friday Grennell said it was, “the right thing to do.”

Without penalties, approximately $445,000 is owed. With penalties, that amount comes to a little less than approximately $500,000.

Slover said the county’s possible seeking of local-private legislation should not be confused with a concession to what PERS has maintained.

“We don’t necessarily believe (their position) is appropriate,” he said. “But we are going to have a conversation with PERS prior to the actual legislation.

“In order to enact local-and-private legislation, it would have to be unanimous and most likely PERS would have to be on board.”

Representatives from PERS will attend a status conference related to the hospital’s bankruptcy July 17 in Natchez.

Slover said the legislation could be crafted following that status conference and submitted to the next session of the legislature, be it a special session or the regular session in January.