ERISA requires plans to provide participants with plan information including important information about plan features and funding; provides fiduciary responsibilities for those who manage and control plan assets; requires plans to establish a grievance and appeals process for participants to get benefits from their plans; and gives participants the right to sue for benefits and breaches of fiduciary duty. Attorneys may represent employees or they may represent the company in the design, preparation, and review of plan, trust, and employee communication documents to implement pension, profit sharing, employee stock ownership, fringe benefit, flexible benefit, and all types of employee welfare plans.
Athens is a village in Claiborne Parish, Louisiana, United States. The population was 262 at the 2000 census. The Pilgrim's Pride poultry hatchery in Athens was designated for closure early in 2009, along with other company businesses in nearby Arcadia in Bienville Parish, Choudrant in Lincoln Parish, and Farmerville in Union Parish, where the company maintained a processing and protein conversion plant. Several weeks later, however, Pilgrim's Pride accepted an $80 million offer from Foster Farms of California to purchase the operations. In addition, to the 1,300 direct jobs, mostly in Farmerville, the purchase spares the small farms of some three hundred independent growers. Foster Farms put up $40 million and the State of Louisiana a matching $40 million. Foster Farms will further invest $10 million in capital improvements at the Farmerville plant, to be matched by the state, in an agreement announced by Governor Bobby Jindal.