Tag Archives: unpaid overtime

Today’s FLSA Question: I am the union president for a mid-sized full-time fire department. Our contract allows substitutions provided the shift commander is aware of the substitution before the start of the shift. Recently, there have been several instances where firefighters working substitutions caught late runs that required them to work past the end of the shift. Normally, firefighters submit ...

The San Diego City Council unanimously approved a $3.4 million settlement with more than 700 city firefighters this week. The settlement resolves a 2019 lawsuit, that was initially filed by only three city firefighters, alleging the city’s pay practices violated the FLSA. Over the course of the next several months hundreds of more firefighters opted into the suit. In the ...

The City of Gloversville, New York has agreed to settle a lawsuit filed by three retired firefighters over alleged violations of the FLSA. According to The Leader-Herald, the settlement provides a total of $110,000 paid to the three retirees and their attorney(s). The crux of the retired firefighters’ claims revolved around the FLSA’s compensatory time (comp time) requirements. In particular, ...

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. ...

A group of more than 1,000 Washington D.C., police officers filed a lawsuit earlier this week in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia alleging the District has shorted the officers’ overtime rate during the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, the officers claim the District has failed to include hazardous duty pay in their regular rate of pay in violation ...

Fire Departments that utilize the FLSA’s §207(k) partial overtime exemption for cross-trained firefighter/EMTs should carefully review their policies and procedures following a recent court decision. The decision, which was handed down by U.S. District Court Judge Ada Brown, invalidated the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport’s Fire Department’s (DFWFD) use of the §207(k) exemption for cross-trained firefighter/EMTs assigned to the department’s EMS ...

The U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) Wage and Hour Division (WHD)—the arm of the DOL responsible for enforcing the FLSA—has announced a major policy shift related to liquidated damages in pre-litigation settlements following DOL investigations. As a result of this change, state and local government employers will likely be able to avoid any liquidated damages in the event a DOL ...

The Cobb County Georgia Fire Department is facing a second lawsuit in as many years for allegedly violating the FLSA. David Simister, a fire captain for Cobb County Fire filed this second suit, on behalf of himself and “other similarly situated individuals,” last week in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia. Simister claims the county’s pay ...

Putnam County, Tennessee has reached a $280,000 settlement agreement with a group of current and former EMTs following a 2019 lawsuit over alleged FLSA violations. The suit, which was initially filed by a lone paramedic last July, contained three basic allegations. First, the county failed to pay for off-the-clock pre-and-post shift work, second, the county improperly implemented the “fluctuating workweek ...

A Pennsylvania firefighter is claiming that his employer failed to pay him and other similarly situated firefighters’ overtime as required by federal law. Keith Still, a firefighter for Manheim Township Fire and Rescue, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania filed the suit on July 13 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Still alleges the township’s pay practices related ...