Tuesday, February 26, 2008

FLSA

An update on the FOP website:
FLSA PROGRESS 02/26/08

On February 21, 2008, our FOP in-house lawyers secured an injunction against the City of Chicago in our ongoing lawsuit to force the City to comply with the Fair Labor Standards Acts (“FLSA”). This injunction has to do with your use of FLSA compensatory time. Here are the highlights: First, the City has been ordered to revise its time due slips and have new slips in use by March 31, 2008. The injunction will take effect the following day. When an officer requests to use FLSA comp time, the City must grant any request made so long as the request is made no less than 48 hours prior to the shift for which the time off is requested. If the Department decides that a replacement sworn member is needed, the Department must seek a replacement worker. Officers requesting FLSA time off may propose names of replacement workers and the Department must consider those individuals.

The Department can deny the use of FLSA compensatory time if, and only if, it reasonably and in good faith anticipates that granting the request would impose an unreasonable burden on the Department’s ability to provide effective police service or would endanger a sworn officer’s safety. The Department has been ordered by the Court to provide a written explanation of any denial – no more denials based on “manpower;” no more returned slips. All denials must now be documented. Finally, the need for the Department to pay premium pay (time and one-half) to attract a replacement worker cannot provide a basis to deny compensatory time off.
Our lawyers have been given the right to conduct periodic audits for one year beginning April 1, 2008, in order to ensure full compliance with the injunction. The City has not yet indicated whether it will appeal the trial court’s ruling. We will keep you apprised of all future developments.



So does anyone see anything really change here? The language seems to still give the city the right to deny time due
"The Department can deny the use of FLSA compensatory time if, and only if, it reasonably and in good faith anticipates that granting the request would impose an unreasonable burden on the Department’s ability to provide effective police service or would endanger a sworn officer’s safety." In other words manpower!
Maybe I'm missing something but I don't see the department changing very much in this regard.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow thanks FOP...BFD!

Anonymous said...

Also, NOT ALL ACCRUED COMP TIME HOURS ARE FLSA HOURS. MOST coppers have ZERO FLSA hours on the books

Anonymous said...

They shouldn't, manpower and your fellow officers safety is more important.

SECOND CITY SARGE said...

Excellent point! I recall going to an FOP general meeting and that very point was glossed over by Donahue and no one seemed to catch it or realized what he had just said.

Anonymous said...

required manning of each watch will be required in order to prevent the city from just putting a car down so they don't have to pay time and a half for a replacement. the fire dept requires 4 men per truck and the city is said to have offered 5% a year raise if the union would give up that benefit the union said no. sgts will really benefit if manning is requied because of the smaller numbers. wharej603

Anonymous said...

One thing has changed W/C's are going to be dropping a lot more paper. There will be a lot of one-man-cars working midnights (oh, there is already!)

Anonymous said...

How do you build up FLSA time? I am going to need to get some!

Anonymous said...

FSLA hours....No wonder this hasn't made a difference. Those of you who don't know, FSLA hours are the hours, over 141 (I think) you work in a month(period.) If you take money, you used o see two lines on your check. (Ye, used to be a detective). One with overtime, one with FSLA overtime. It is premium pay (difference is minute, maybe a quarter or so...It's been a while since I've had that much overtime in a period. I'm sure some of the readers can give the exact numbers.

Either way, if you take time, it is the first to go. You can not accrue FSLA time until you retire unless you NEVER take time or take less than you make.
Second, the city will force you to take money if you have too many FSLA hours on the books. THEY WILL NOT ALLOW YOU TO ACCRUE MORE TIME...

This rulin means shit....

Anonymous said...

Either way, if you take time, it is the first to go. You can not accrue FSLA time until you retire unless you NEVER take time or take less than you make.
##############
you can never accrue fsla time for more than maybe 6 months, after which u r automatically paid for it per fed. law... if u have any on books ane u take cu, that is the time u will b using...
171 hours in a cycle is the magic #, BUT it is ONLYactual hours worked, Not 3 hours 4 court, bit the 15 minutes you actually spent there...(just used as an example, not to slam anyone)

Anonymous said...

don't worry about the flsa time due
worry about the new contract
10 or 12 hour days and we won't have to take time due
will we have a new contract this year

Anonymous said...

don't worry about the flsa time due
worry about the new contract
10 or 12 hour days and we won't have to take time due
........................

You will work a 12 hour day and you don't think that will cut into your kid's activities. family events, doctor and school appointments?

Report to 35th and Michigan NOW for your piss test.

Anonymous said...

You will work a 12 hour day and you don't think that will cut into your kid's activities. family events, doctor and school appointments?

Report to 35th and Michigan NOW for your piss test.
___________________________________

Bring on the 12 hour days. No it won't cut into kids activities, family events, etc.... I will have a lot more time off to do these things. I want my 4 days off every week that I will get. This will give me a lot more time to do the stuff I want. And I am drug free. I was teased with the 10 hour days and the 3 (4 day weekends) I got instead of the 2 (3 day weekends) everyone else had and my weekends came after working 3 weeks with 3 days off M-Tu-Wed, Tue-Wed-Thur, Wed-Thur-Fr-, Fri-Sat-Sun-Mon, Sat-Sun-Mon-Tue,

Please keep in mind that this is an open blog
that can and is read by people other than Chicago Police Officers.