Jess Feinman, F.S.A. Consulting Actuary
Prior to the formation of Columbia Actuary, LLC, Jess was a self-employed
consulting actuary, providing actuarial services in the retirement plans field.
His clients included small corporations, self-employed individuals, and pension
administration firms with plans ranging in size from one to more than six
thousand participants. As a consultant to the United States General Accounting
Office, he has reviewed the allocation of costs under one of the federal
survivors' annuities systems. As a part-time employee of B.L. Seamon &
Associates, under a contract with the Division of Cost Allocation &
Liaison, to provide support for the Office of Audit Services, Office of
Inspector General, United States Department of Health and Human Services, he
has reviewed the reasonableness of the actuarial methods and assumptions used
in the actuarial valuations of several state and local government pension
plans, in one case independently reproducing the valuation. Jess has testified
as an expert witness before the courts of many area jurisdictions. He is a
Fellow of the Society of Actuaries, a Member of the
Jess taught actuarial science for the Actuaries Club of New York to actuarial
trainees preparing for Society of Actuaries examinations, and for Actuarial
Study Materials to actuarial trainees preparing for Joint Board for the
Enrollment of Actuaries examinations. He has addressed the Enrolled Actuaries
Meeting and the Internal Revenue Service Southeast Key District Office Employee
Benefits Conference on the subject of maximum benefits and contributions under
the Internal Revenue Code. He has addressed negotiators for the Division of
Cost Allocation & Liaison, United States Department of Health and Human
Services on the subject of funding of government pension plans, and has made
presentations before the Middle Atlantic Actuarial Club and several
Prior to establishing his own consulting firm, Jess was Vice President and
Actuary for Herget and Company, Inc., a Baltimore-based employee benefits
consulting firm. He directed the operations of the Retirement Plans Department,
which provided the actuarial and administrative services to all of the pension
and profit-sharing clients in the
Before joining Herget and Company, Jess was an Actuary with Kwasha Lipton,
where he was responsible for the actuarial valuation of more than forty defined
benefit pension plans. His responsibilities included the determination of
annual pension costs and the preparation of annual valuation reports, the
preparation of cost estimates for plan amendments including proposals in
connection with union negotiations, and preparing pension cost and cash flow
projections. He was previously Assistant Director of Group Pensions for the
Mutual Life Insurance Company Of New York, where his
responsibilities included the determination of annual statement reserves for
group annuities, the determination of interest rate guarantees and credits, and
the design, testing and implementation of new types of pension contracts.
Jess received a Bachelor of Science degree in Physics from the