The Worker, Retiree and Employer Recovery Act of 2008 – known as WRERA – contains technical corrections to the Pension Protection Act of 2006.

The Pension Protection Act, or PPA, made it possible for employers to allow any non-spouse beneficiary of an employee’s retirement plan—including an employee’s same-sex partner—to roll inherited retirement benefits directly to an individual retirement account and avoid immediate taxation.

WRERA requires that all employers provide this rollover opportunity to non-spouse beneficiaries.

“This legislation secures much-needed protection for lesbian and gay couples,” said Human Rights Campaign President Joe Solmonese.

“Our community faces unique challenges in preparing for retirement because we are denied Social Security spousal and survivor benefits. Protecting our hard-earned retirement savings is even more crucial to us, and until now, the tax code made it that much harder.”

Before 2007, partners who inherited retirement plan savings typically faced immediate taxation on inherited benefits, unlike opposite-sex spouses, who could roll savings over to an IRA with no tax penalty.

Under the PPA, which came into effect in 2007, qualifying plans could permit any non-spouse beneficiary—including a domestic partner, parent or sibling—to roll over inherited retirement benefits paid as a lump sum directly to an IRA. Qualifying plans include defined benefit plans pensions, 401K plans, employee stock ownership plans, profit-sharing plans, money purchase plans, 403B plans and governmental 457B plans.

But the provision was subsequently interpreted to be optional for employers, meaning each company had to affirmatively adopt this protection for partners under each qualifying plan.

Under the WRERA, which takes effect in January 2010, all qualifying plans that pay lump sum benefits to non-spouse beneficiaries are required to provide the rollover opportunity.

“This is progress toward eliminating the more than 1,000 inequities that our families face under federal law,” said Solmonese.

He also called on employers to make the rollover provision available as quickly as possible and not wait for the 2010 deadline. Solmonese said that LGBT workers should ensure their partners and children are designated as beneficiaries.

Land for the RainbowVision project was reclaimed this week by its lender in a foreclosure auction.

The land, at East Palm Canyon Drive and Gene Autry Trail, was mortgaged for $9.6 million. The lender, Senior Housing Partners III, took it back, successfully bidding $8 million for the 13-acre site.

RainbowVision had planned to build 184 condos, with a pool and tennis courts, and a clubhouse with spa, nightclub and cafe. It was to have been the first LGBT seniors community in Palm Springs.

RainbowVision president Joy Silver said it is possible the complex will someday be built, but not until the economy improves.

“The only thing stopping us is the economy — the fact that banks have not been in a position to make construction loans,” Silver told The Desert Sun newspaper. “We plan to move forward as soon as the economy allows.”

Dozens of people have paid deposits on the Palm Springs project. Silver said many of the prospective buyers have agreed to keep their reservations intact. Others have had their deposits returned.

The money crunch appears to only have affected RainbowVision’s Palm Springs site.

San Francisco-based RainbowVision opened its first LGBT seniors community in Santa Fe, New Mexico in 2006. It also announced plans earlier this year for other projects in San Francisco and Vancouver, Canada.

The New Mexico project is operating with 100 percent occupancy, Silver said. It features condominiums along with independent-living and assisted-living apartments.

The crisis in the mortgage market has tightened credit throughout the world. In an attempt to free up lending money in the US the Federal Reserve announced Wednesday it would slash its target interest rate to nearly zero.

The central bank also pledged to use “all available tools” to fight the current downturn. It said it was likely that rates would be kept at “exceptionally low levels” for some time to come.