Tag Archives: battalion chief

A group of ten Alexandria, Virginia battalion chiefs filed an FLSA lawsuit this past week alleging the city improperly classifies them as overtime exempt “white-collar” employees in violation of both federal and state law. According to the complaint, six of the battalion chiefs are assigned to 24-hour shifts and serve as “Operational Battalion Chiefs.” The remaining four plaintiffs work a ...

Senior United States District Court Judge Rebecca Beach Smith has approved a $200,000 settlement in a FLSA misclassification lawsuit filed late last year by a group of Emergency Medical Service (EMS) Captains, in Virginia Beach, Virginia. The settlement, which was officially approved by the court on Friday December 10, 2021, requires the City of Virginia Beach to pay a total ...

Today’s FLSA Question: I am a non-exempt battalion chief for a municipal fire department. Our department requires all non-exempt chief officers, like myself receive FLSA comp time in lieu of FLSA overtime. Recently, the city changed some comp time policies. First, the maximum number of comp time hours an employee can accrue is now capped at 300 hours. Previously, we ...

The Fire Law Group is pleased to announce a series of advanced live three-hour webinars dedicated to the most important and challenging FLSA wage and hour issues impacting fire departments, firefighters, and other public safety professionals today. The first is scheduled for Wednesday, October 20, 2021 and is entitled: Calculating Regular Rate for Firefighters and other First Responders. This program ...

In an important and highly anticipated decision, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit upheld a 2019 federal court decision denying FLSA overtime for seven Chesapeake, Virginia Battalion Chiefs without the need of a trial. While this decision, which was handed down unanimously by a three-judge panel last Friday, only applies to a small handful of battalion ...

Retired First Deputy Fire Chief Gary Mogel has filed an FLSA lawsuit against his former employer, the City of Reading, Pennsylvania alleging the city violated the FLSA by failing to pay fire department shift commanders any overtime. This lawsuit is the latest of several recent lawsuits involving fire department shift commanders challenging their employer’s classification as “white-collar” overtime exempt employees. ...

The Newton County Fire Department has reached a settlement with three battalion chiefs (BCs) following a 2019 lawsuit over FLSA overtime. The three BCs filed the suit in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia in November 2019. The three alleged the county improperly reclassified BCs from overtime eligible first responders to overtime exempt employees in July 2018. ...

Three Newton County, Georgia Battalion Chiefs (BCs) have filed a federal lawsuit claiming the County’s Fire Department fails to pay them overtime in violation of the FLSA. Battalion Chiefs Bobby Cagle, Brian Massey, and Ralph “Trey” Stewart III filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, on November 27, 2019. Specifically, the three BCs ...

Retired Division Chief Ronald Pelham has reached a $115,000 court approved settlement with the City of Monrovia, California following an FLSA lawsuit. Pelham alleged, in his September 2018 complaint that the Monrovia Fire Department misclassified him as an overtime exempt executive employee and failed to pay him any FLSA overtime. Pelham’s lawsuit was one of several filed across the country ...

In the latest legal twist involving battalion chiefs (shift commanders) and FLSA overtime eligibility, United States Magistrate Judge Lawrence R. Leonard has dismissed an overtime lawsuit filed by seven Chesapeake, Virginia Battalion Chiefs (BCs). The seven BCs filed the suit last July, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern Division of Virginia, alleging the City of Chesapeake failed to ...