Employee Benefit Plans

6 Months Ended

Jun. 30, 2019

Retirement Benefits [Abstract]

Employee Benefit Plans

Employee Benefit Plans

We sponsor noncontributory defined benefit pension plans and non-qualified Supplemental Executive Retirement Plans ("SERPs"). The accrual for future benefits has been frozen in our defined benefit pension plans and SERPs.

We sponsor a defined contribution plan covering substantially all non-union and certain union employees. We match a portion of employees' voluntary contributions to this plan.

The components of the employee benefit plans expense consisted of the following:

	Three Months Ended   June 30,						Six Months Ended   June 30,
(in thousands)	2019			2018			2019			2018
Interest cost	$	5,800		$	5,925		$	11,600		$	11,850
Expected return on plan assets, net of expenses	(5,058		)	(5,733		)	(10,116		)	(11,465		)
Amortization of actuarial loss and prior service cost	572			920			1,144			1,841
Total for defined benefit pension plans	1,314			1,112			2,628			2,226
Multi-employer plans	58			44			99			91
SERPs	250			277			508			551
Defined contribution plan	1,695			1,978			4,690			4,771
Net periodic benefit cost	3,317			3,411			7,925			7,639
Allocated to discontinued operations	—			(174		)	—			(377		)
Net periodic benefit cost — continuing operations	$	3,317		$	3,237		$	7,925		$	7,262

We contributed $0.5 million to fund current benefit payments for our SERPs and $6.5 million for our defined benefit pension plans during the six months ended June 30, 2019. During the remainder of 2019, we anticipate contributing an additional $0.7 million to fund the SERPs' benefit payments and an additional $12.1 million to fund our qualified defined benefit pension plans.