By Sam Janesch
Baltimore Sun
BALTIMORE — Maryland correctional officers will receive a $13 million settlement as federal and state officials continue to investigate the illegal withholding of overtime pay from thousands of public safety employees.
Nearly 3,900 officers will receive the delayed wages almost three years after U.S. Department of Labor officials first contacted the state’s Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services about a federal investigation into the agency’s timekeeping practices.
That investigation found employees were working past their scheduled shifts but supervisors were not providing signed approval, so overtime wages were not being properly paid.
“We are finally seeing a glimmer of hope,” said Patrick Moran, president of Council 3 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, as the state Board of Public Works approved the payment Wednesday.
Moran, whose union represents 6,000 people in the department that runs the state’s prisons, called the settlement the second-largest wage theft settlement for correctional officers in U.S. history.
The wage theft, which occurred between November 2018 and August 2021, was initially revealed last year.
Federal labor officials announced in January 2022 that staff at Jessup Correctional Institution routinely had their timecards altered to pay them only through the end of scheduled shifts instead of when they actually clocked out. The practice violated the federal Fair Labor Standards Act and prison staff were owed $468,239 as a result.
While that money was repaid last year, the investigation expanded to all of the state’s correctional institutions.
A systemwide analysis found 3,874 current and former employees were owed unpaid wages. An agreement of $13 million was reached in March, and Gov. Wes Moore’s administration added $15 million in a supplemental budget to cover the costs.
Moran — speaking to the three-member Board of Public Works that includes Moore, Comptroller Brooke Lierman and Treasurer Dereck Davis — said the union worked extensively with the federal investigators after employees were told by department leaders for years that there were no problems.
“Very simply, they were lied to by the department, because individuals and management had to plan, had to authorize and execute this plan,” Moran said. “It was not a computer glitch because it happened in every single institution across the state.”
In an interview after the meeting, Moran said the problem could extend to hundreds of additional correctional employees, putting the total number “well over 4,000″ by the end of the probe.
Three classifications of employees — correctional officer I and II and correctional officer sergeant — are covered under the new settlement, according to a letter from Carolyn Scruggs, secretary of the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services.
Other classifications — such as supply officers, dietary officers and maintenance officers — will be reviewed in the ongoing investigation, Scruggs wrote. Any additional compensation owed to them also will be reviewed with federal labor officials and be submitted to the Board of Public Works, she wrote.
Moran said AFSCME, which represents tens of thousands of state workers across different state agencies, also is looking into related wage issues in other state government agencies after getting complaints from workers. The U.S. Department of Labor is not involved in those efforts at the moment, he said.
Moore pledged to cooperate with the federal investigators on the corrections issue or in any other areas of state government where back wages may be due.
“We not only owe them this long overdue back pay. Frankly, we owe them an apology … and an apology for the years that have gone by that the state still has not made them whole,” said Moore, mentioning both “inadequate timekeeping systems” and possibly “inappropriate” policies the department had in place.
Moran said that while the timekeeping practices are no longer in place, the union is working with the agency to create even stronger safeguards to make sure timecards cannot be changed without proper authorization.
He also repeatedly stressed the need for accountability, saying union members do not believe anyone in the department has been disciplined for actions that led to the wage theft. Spokespeople for the governor’s office did not respond to requests for comment about any internal disciplinary action, and the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services referred The Baltimore Sun to the governor’s office.
“People need to be held accountable because they stole employees’ money,” Moran said. “They thought that people working for free was acceptable. It is not acceptable ever in any situation.”
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