Carbon County's retirement fund is riding on the stock market roller coaster, as volatility in the first two months of the year played tug-of-war with its portfolio values.

On Thursday, Robert Crampsie, county controller and secretary to the retirement board, reported that the retirement fund portfolio value as of Feb. 29 was $67,171,057, just $96,000 higher than on Feb. 1 due to the monthly disbursements that totaled just under $800,000. Disbursements include paying retirees their benefit, and this month, included a reimbursement to the county general fund for 2015 expenses and administrative fees."February was really a flat month," he said. "The good news, and there hasn't really been good news in January and February, is that so far the month of March, we're up over $2 million. We're getting a real nice bounce this month."Crampsie pointed out that the first two months of the first quarter have not been kind to the county's retirement fund, even though retirees will not see any of those effects in their payments, but added that current positive trends are hopefully a sign of things to come."We're hoping what we've seen early in the year was just a market correction and we start moving forward and end up having a pretty decent year," he said.