ST. LOUIS -- State budget cuts have led the Missouri retirement system to put on hold $162,258 in staff bonuses.

Fifty-seven staffers had been on track to receive the payments on June 29.

Missouri State Employees Retirement System Executive Director Gary Findlay said in an e-mail to retirement system board members that his employees had earned bonuses under a complex incentive pay program. But he said it would be "virtually impossible" to defend the payments because of the media's "gross mischaracterizations" of the incentive plan.

Gov. Jay Nixon was among the critics of investment and operations staff earning about $460,000 in bonuses as the investment system lost $1.8 billion in 2008.

His spokesman, Scott Holste, said halting the June bonuses was "an appropriate first step to reform a process that has gotten out of control."