Teresa Rae Pofok

TERESA R. POFOK 

Since 1994, Teresa Pofok’s practice has been devoted to the representation of multiemployer benefit plans jointly sponsored by unions and management. After starting her legal career with a union labor law firm, she served as an in-house compliance consultant with The Segal Company, a national multiemployer actuarial and consulting firm. This background provides her with a detailed understanding of the critical funding issues confronting most pension and health funds today. 

Focusing her practice primarily on administration and compliance issues of employee benefit plans, she provides clients with day-to-day counseling regarding the Taft-Hartley Act, ERISA, Internal Revenue Code, MPPAA, HIPAA, Medicare, COBRA, USERRA, Pension Protection Act of 2006 and the recently enacted Workers Retirees and Employers Recovery Act of 2008. As legal counselor to the funds, she assists trustees and fund personnel in avoiding pitfalls under the complex federal laws that impact their plans and fiduciary duties. 

In addition to her work with benefit plans, Teresa serves as Special Counsel to assist bargaining parties and trustees in identifying and managing the challenges facing underfunded defined benefit plans, along with funding issues involving health care benefits. She also serves as an expert witness.

Teresa graduated, cum laude, from Kent State University and earned her Juris Doctorate from Rutgers University College of Law at Camden. She is a member of the Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association, Ohio State Bar Association and American Bar Association. She was recognized in the 2006 edition of Ohio Rising Stars magazine. 

Teresa lives in the Kamm’s Corners neighborhood of Cleveland with her husband George Pofok and their three children.