Ron Baker is set to become the next executive director of the Public Employees’ Retirement Association of Colorado, the state employees’ pension plan said Monday.

He has been the interim leader since December after Greg Smith died while on a family vacation in Hawaii. Smith, 56, had led PERA since 2012.

The retirement system has $49 billion in defined benefit assets and serves more than 580,000 current and retired public employees, including teachers, prison system employees, state troopers and some municipal workers.

Baker will oversee 290 employees and an $80 million annual budget.

He had served as PERA’s chief administrative officer since 2013. He was named chief technology officer in 2009.

Baker worked with the legislature to pass Senate Bill 200, the long-term plan to fill a $32 billion shortfall in the pension. In March he was elected to the Board of Directors for the Council of Institutional Investors.

A Colorado native, he graduated from the University of Northern Colorado with a degree in mathematics, with a dual emphasis in computer science and liberal arts mathematics. Baker also is a graduate of the Executive Leadership Program at the Daniels College of Business at the University of Denver.