City settles Ga. firefighters’ overtime complaint

The settlement denied liability and authorized paying the group of firefighters $58,455.32, an average of about $688 each

July 15, 2015 09:27 AM

The Augusta Chronicle

AUGUSTA, Ga. — A week after paying a former deputy coroner $200,000 in Fair Labor Standards Act and whistleblower complaints, the Augusta Commission on Tuesday authorized another settlement with workers alleging they were improperly paid for overtime work.

A class-action lawsuit filed by Augusta Fire Department Lt. Robert Morris last October claimed Morris and approximately 85 of his fire department colleagues hadn’t been paid the appropriate overtime rate based on the extra pay all received to be certified as paramedics or emergency medical technicians.

Since 2010 the city has paid firefighters an additional $1,800 annually to maintain certification as paramedics and $1,200 to be certified as EMTs.

When the firefighters worked more than 212 hours in 28 days and became eligible under FLSA for overtime, however, the certification pay wasn’t used to calculate their overtime rate, claimed the suit filed in U.S. District Court.

The settlement approved by the commission in a 6-0 vote denied liability and authorized paying the group of firefighters $58,455.32, an average of about $688 each.

Tracy Arther, a plaintiff in the class-action suit and vice president of Augusta Professional Firefighters Association, said Morris and the other plaintiffs were reviewing the settlement offer but hadn’t decided whether to accept it.

“We’ll see what the paperwork looks like,” Arther said. “The biggest thing is them not admitting they have been neglecting to pay us correctly under federal law. They knew about it and didn’t correct it.”

Last week, the commission approved paying former deputy coroner Johnny McDonald $200,000 to settle his complaints he’d been illegally classified as a manager under FLSA and denied overtime wages for several years and been retaliated against for reporting former coroner Grover Tuten’s thefts of money and property from the dead to the FBI.

Like the firefighters, McDonald said in his lawsuit he’d repeatedly raised the issue of improperly paid overtime with city staff but had been ignored.

An effort last fall to correct the certified firefighters’ pay discrepancy resulted in the “keying error” that former Human Resources Director Tanika Bryant said caused more than 200 firefighters to receive an extra $2,500 to $2,700 in a single pay period. They were asked to return the money.