Finance & Personnel Committee

FINANCE & PERSONNEL COMMITTEE September 12, 2023 6:45pm PRESENT: Chairperson Rusniak, Members Fulop, Savage and Kohler ALSO PRESENT: City Administrator Steve Volkert, Lieutenant Cummings and City Attorney Ian Prust Call to Order – Chairperson Rusniak called the meeting to order at 6:45 p.m. in the Common Council Chambers of Hartford City Hall, 109 North Main Street. Roll Call – All members were present. Public Comment Period – None. Discussion and consideration of authorizing the appropriate City officials to enter into the two Letters of Agreement with WPPA/LEER Local #464 pending any legal language edits, if necessary, and approval by WPPA/LEER Local #464 – Lieutenant Cummings explained that the first agreement discusses flexible scheduling with the police liaison officers. They are scheduled to work 8 hours per day however, HUHS and Harford Jt 1 would like them to work 9 hours per day so they could cover the beginning and the end of the school day. The arrangement would be that they work 9 hours every day and then that extra hour a day goes into a work back file like the patrol officers and those hours would be used on school days where there are no students in the building or for vacation time. Chairperson Rusniak asked if this has been run past the entire department. Lieutenant Cummings advised that yes it has. Alderperson Fulop wanted to clarify whether this was essentially comp time which Lieutenant Cummings confirmed it is but they refer to it as work back. Attorney Ian Prust further explained the work back time is due to working 9 hours a day as opposed to 8 hours a day. MOTION by Alderperson Savage, seconded by Alderperson Fulop approving authorizing the appropriate City officials to enter into the first Letter of Agreement with WPPA/LEER Local #464 pending any legal language edits, if necessary, and approval by WPPA/LEER Local #464 MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY. City Attorney Ian Prust explained that the second letter of agreement addresses the switch to 12 hour shifts which is allowed under the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”)and provides for work back hours. This would give officers 4 hours of work back which is used essentially as comp time. There is a convoluted calculator of work time for officers which is if someone works for more than 172 hours over a 4 week period we have to recalculate overtime. This agreement includes that language to ensure we are fully compliant with FLSA. There is no significant difference as this only applies a small handful of times over the course of a year as officers have enough vacation, work back time, etc. The second letter provides flexibility for certain events so the officers could be paid for things like Shop with a Cop, etc. instead of it being volunteer time and this would be at the Chief’s discretion. The first letter is fully approved by the Union but they are still working on the final details of the second letter. Alderperson Fulop wanted to know whose authority the 12 hours is based on. City Attorney Ian Prust explained that there is an exception in the FLSA for legal and fire employees that the normal 40 hour work week for overtime doesn’t apply to them. Different thresholds apply for protected services so this includes that final calculation for overtime. Alderperson Fulop wanted to confirm that there is no extra burden on the city for this. City Attorney Ian Prust confirmed that is correct. MOTION by Alderperson Savage, seconded by Alderperson Kohler approving authorizing the appropriate City officials to enter into the second Letter of Agreement with WPPA/LEER Local #464 pending any legal language edits, if necessary, and approval by WPPA/LEER Local #464 MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY. Adjournment – MOTION by Alderperson Savage, seconded by Alderperson Kohler for adjournment at 6:51 p.m. MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY. Respectfully submitted, Shanna Kreilkamp, City Clerk FPSEP12.23