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| Madison Metropolitan School District Madison, Wisconsin Art Rainwater, Superintendent | ||
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| BOARD OF EDUCATION Minutes for Human Resources February 3, 2003 |
Doyle Administration Building 545 West Dayton Street, Room 103 Madison, Wisconsin |
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(Portion of meeting held in Closed Session omitted.)
Board member Bill Keys joined the meeting at this time. Staff member Donna Williams left at this point and Rita Applebaum, Jane Belmore, Valencia Douglas, Doug Pearson, Attorney Clarence Sherrod, and Ken Syke, joined the meeting.
It was moved by Bill Clingan and seconded by Shwaw Vang to approve the minutes of the Human Resources Committee in open session dated December 16, 2002 as distributed. Motion unanimously carried.
There were no public appearances. Written registrations included two in opposition to the recent termination of ten Local 60 employees who were then rehired in two weeks.
There were no announcements.
(Packets included confidential custodial memoranda of understanding concerning the November 20, 2002 terminations and subsequent reinstatements of custodians. Copies are attached to the original of these minutes.)
Jack Bernfeld, Staff Representative with Local 60, AFSCME, AFL-CIO, described for the committee the events that occurred relative to the firing of eight custodial and two food service workers around the Thanksgiving holiday. He stated that they were all back to work now. The employees ranged from a 19-year custodial worker with a clean work record who was accused of misrepresenting his time, amounting to about $2.00, and a three-week food service worker doing all the aspects of her job according to her supervisor. He described their treatment as a horrible and humiliating experience. These disputes have been resolved but the resolutions were really unsatisfactory. He felt it was an extraordinary series of events and thought the Board should look at the situation and explain why this happened.
The Superintendent responded that an agreement had been reached with AFSCME, Local 60 that no blame would be placed on either side and that this meeting with the Board committee violated that good-faith agreement. He indicated that the custodial employees are required to sign a form in order to get additional pay for night work. The issue here was that administration had evidence that employees did not work those hours. The employees received notifications not to do that. They continued to do it. Then it was determined that they should be terminated. Other things happened then that were not part of the original investigation. It became clear that it was not a termination offense. After the stories changed and the administration began to get more information, the approach was changed. The agreement was reached by both sides on the discipline that was given. Administration acted on the best information it had at the time. The agreements in the packet admit no wrongdoing.
Discussion: Notifications involved warnings not to sign the forms unless particular hours are worked for differential pay. Money was not substantial but there were multiple occurrences. Employees were warned that they cannot change shifts without supervisor approval. A general notice was sent to all employees and that is when additional information began to come in about the supervisors' giving permission to come in early. An initial look at the cases made it appear to be shaving time. A normal shift was 2 to 10 p.m. and the differential pay came in for 2 to 10 p.m. when administration knew the employees were leaving early based on alarm reports. When asked, the employees said no that they had not been given permission to come in early. It was not a differential pay issue but time shaving, which is much bigger. After the terminations took place, the investigation continued and the stories changed. Employees did come in early and had been given permission. From the terminated employees' points of view, they knew administration would see they were changing shift hours. It was Mr. Nadler's understanding that the employees did not want to draw attention to this practice. When administration found out that it was only a matter of shift differential, that changed the whole case.
These are the kinds of things that predisciplinary hearings are for. Does the contract go right to termination? Meetings were held the same day as the terminations. Mr. Pearson noted that on two occasions preliminary interviews were held. The employees said they were leaving early and that is what led to the terminations. There was no progressive discipline but a recommendation to terminate based on the multiple events. Other information began to come in and the approach was changed.
The employees had been told earlier that a shift change required permission from Central Office and that people at the buildings did not have that authority. In the original interview it was reported that there was permission was not given to change shifts. Follow-up came in the form of letters.
Juan José López arrived at 5:55 p.m.
Communication breakdown needs to be repaired. There are times when termination on-the-spot is appropriate. Other things require a process to get at the facts and that did not happen here. Concern is that this was too much. Full disclosure in writing needs to happen before a firing.
Mr. Bernfeld requested that a procedure be set in place to avoid this in the future and to get at all the facts before a firing takes place.
Mr. Allen directed the Superintendent to come back to the committee with a procedure in place to address these issues, including the misunderstanding about the level of authority of the building personnel.
The Superintendent agreed to provide procedures but noted that people need to give all the facts when they are interviewed. Some employees did lose some money as a result of the terminations which served as their respective disciplines. Each agreement was individualized and everyone was made whole.
Mr. Allen noted that the written registrations indicated disappointment in the way the district handled this matter.
No discussion.
It was moved by Shwaw Vang and seconded by Bill Clingan to adjourn the meeting at 6:05 p.m. Motion unanimously carried.
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