Tag Archives: state laws

Today’s FLSA Question: I am a paid firefighter for a small non-profit volunteer fire company. Our organization has a large group of volunteer firefighters and an all-volunteer chief and command staff. I am one of two full-time (Monday-Friday) firefighters. I am treated as an hourly employee, however, I do not receive any overtime. Between trainings, after-hours calls, and regularly scheduled ...

Today’s FLSA Question: I am a paid municipal firefighter for a small fire department. When our firefighters utilize vacation, sick, or personal leave, the city deducts this time from the firefighter’s hours worked for FLSA overtime purposes. However, a neighboring community’s fire department counts all scheduled hours for overtime purposes. Basically, the firefighters in that town receive overtime every payday ...

Fifty-eight Morgantown, West Virginia firefighters have filed a lawsuit alleging the City of Morgantown failed to pay overtime as required under West Virginia state law. The crux of the firefighter’s argument stems from a very unique West Virginia statute that requires time-and-one-half pay for firefighters required to work holidays. Here is a portion of that statute: §8-15-10a. Firemen who are ...

Today’s FLSA Question: I recently read a story on your website about Rhode Island enacting a new law requiring firefighters be paid overtime after working only 42 hours per week. But the FLSA only mandates overtime pay after firefighters work 53 hours per week. Doesn’t federal law (FLSA) trump (or pre-empt) state law? Answer: Good question. You are not alone ...

The State of Rhode Island (RI) has enacted historic legislation expanding overtime protection for firefighters working in the state. The new law [well, to be precise, it is actually an elimination of a past exemption and the expansion of an existing statute] mandates overtime pay for local firefighters for all hours worked over an “average” of forty-two hours per week. ...

Today’s FLSA Question: I am the fire chief of a full-time paid fire department with seven stations. Firefighters bid by seniority to a preferred station. We utilize an out-of-rank system to fill most vacancies within the officer ranks. This out-of-rank system requires senior firefighters to move up and cover vacant officer positions. This can result in firefighters being required to ...

Three flight paramedics and one flight nurse have filed an FLSA lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona, against their employer, Air Methods Corporation. The suit alleges Air Methods improperly deducts sleep time from employees hours worked in an effort to evade FLSA overtime requirements. While this suit only includes four plaintiffs at this time, attorneys ...

A group of fifteen firefighters and their local union, are suing the Town of Chesterton, Indiana, over unpaid overtime that dates back almost 10 years. The suit, which was filed on February 16, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana alleges the town has “willingly, deliberately and intentionally refused to pay Chesterton Firefighters for time and ...

A New York EMT is suing his employer for violations of both the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and New York wage and hour laws. Ronald Tappen, an EMT for the Lindenhurst Fire Department filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York on January 22. Tappen alleges the town failed to pay him ...

Captain Margerita Noland-Moore, a paramedic for the City of Cleveland’s Division of Emergency Medical Services, has filed a lawsuit against the city alleging she and as many as 300 other city EMS employees have been shorted overtime pay. The complaint, which was filed on November 26, alleges several specific violations of both the FLSA and Ohio law. According to the ...