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Kelly A. Starr is a member of the Executive Compensation & Employee Benefits group and the firm’s Board of Directors.
Ms. Starr counsels a variety of employers on all aspects of employee benefits law, including the design, tax qualification, legal compliance, correction, interpretation, communication and termination of broad-based employee benefit plans. She also negotiates and structures executive employment agreements and executive compensation and benefit arrangements, including incentive compensation and deferred compensation agreements, severance agreements and change-in-control programs, on behalf of both individual executives and companies. She has substantial experience advising boards of directors and their committees with respect to executive compensation issues.

In late 2022, Congress passed the SECURE Act 2.0, which, along with other items, introduced a new rule requiring that catch-up contributions made by highly compensated employees be made on a Roth after-tax basis only. Less than one year later, and only a few months before this new rule was to go into effect, the IRS issued Notice 2023-62, which provides highly anticipated transition relief for the Roth catch-up contribution rule by extending the compliance period by two years.Continue Reading Just Dropped: IRS Provides Relief on Roth Contributions for HCEs