Robert P. Schultze will become ICMA-RC’s president and CEO effective February 17, 2015. Schultze replaces Joan McCallen, who is retiring after 18 years as president and CEO of ICMA-RC.

A well-established leader in the public sector retirement community and an authority on pension administration, Schultze has been director of the Virginia Retirement System (VRS) since 2005. VRS is the 21st largest U.S. pension plan and the 49th largest pension plan in the world, operating retirement and insurance programs for 600,000 state and local government employees, retirees, and beneficiaries and for 1,000 state and local agencies in Virginia. Additionally, Schultze serves on the Governmental Accounting Standards Advisory Council, which advises the GASB board on governmental accounting rules. He also is on the executive board of the National Association of Retirement Administrators.

J. Thomas Lundy, county manager, Catawba County, N.C., and chair of the ICMA-RC Board of Directors, said “Bob Schultze is exceptionally qualified to lead ICMA-RC in achieving its mission of helping public sector employees build retirement security. Bob has a proven allegiance to the public sector, has demonstrated successful leadership throughout his career, has thorough knowledge of retirement systems, and he is poised to continue ICMA-RC’s innovative thinking on retirement security.”

The seeds of ICMA-RC were sown in the late 1960s, when what was then the International City Management Association, under the direction of Executive Director Mark E. Keane, set out to address the lack of retirement plan vestment opportunities experienced by professional local government managers. Keane, the ICMA staff, and the members of the ICMA Insurance-Retirement Committee worked diligently from 1968 to 1972 to turn the dream of a portable deferred compensation retirement plan for public sector employees into reality. In March 1972, with a grant from the Ford Foundation, ICMA secured official approval from the Internal Revenue Service to establish a deferred compensation program that would ensure retirement income for its members.

Because of ICMA’s vision in 1972 to create a portable retirement system for public sector employees, ICMA-RC has grown from a single participant to close to 1.2 million participant accounts under management and administration today.

In 2007, ICMA-RC partnered with ICMA to help found the Center for State and Local Government Excellence (SLGE). The organization was created to respond to the challenges facing state and local governments, especially as they address issues affecting public sector retirement and employment benefits. Since its inception, SLGE has published more than 100 issue briefs on relevant public sector subjects and has been a resource to governments across the nation.

At ICMA-RC, Schultze will lead an organization of over 750 associates committed to serving those who have devoted their careers to serving their communities. ICMA-RC is a nonprofit independent financial services corporation that manages and administers more than $57 billion dollars in assets as of December 30, 2014. All of ICMA-RC’s services have been developed specifically for public sector retirement plan administrators and participants to fulfill the mission of helping local and state employees build retirement security.