HRA workers sue over unpaid overtime

Nearly 380 employees at the city Human Resources Administration filed a lawsuit earlier this month over unpaid overtime and are seeking back pay.

The eligibility specialists, who verify whether applicants qualify for critical benefits, including Medicaid, food stamps and cash assistance, alleged that the city has routinely not paid them for work they performed during their unpaid lunch breaks and after their scheduled work hours.

The employees are scheduled to work 35 hours a week, and have a daily one-hour lunch break that’s not compensated. They also work “at least five hours of pre-approved, compensated overtime each week,” bringing their total scheduled hours to at least 40 hours, according to the suit, which was filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan.

The complaint, Hinds et al v. City of New York, states that eligibility specialists, who often worked beyond their scheduled shifts, were not paid one and one-half times their regular pay rate for each hour they worked past 40 hours. 

'Systemic, willful violation'

The suit alleges that the city’s continued failure to compensate workers for all of the work they performed was a “systemic, continuing, willful, and purposeful violation” of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act.

It cited the city’s timekeeping system, CityTime, for using a "pay-to-schedule" system,

which by default pays employees according to their scheduled work hours, rather than a "pay-to-punch" system, by which they would be paid for the hours they actually worked, as a main reason for why the employees' work hours have regularly gone uncompensated.

For example, Lisa Blango, who works at an HRA site in Brooklyn, routinely worked for 30 minutes of her unpaid lunch period, and when combined with other tasks she performed following her scheduled shifts, was “regularly not compensated for at least 3 hours and 15 minutes of regular overtime work” each week, according to the suit. 

It also notes that HRA supervisors were aware employees were working outside of their scheduled shifts but did not discipline them for doing so.

The suit also alleges that the city failed to pay night shift differentials for hours worked after 6 p.m. and that when the city did pay overtime, it routinely delayed the overtime payments. One worker said that it took 35 days or more for her to be paid for her pre-approved overtime on multiple occasions over the past three years, despite the fact that “the FLSA mandates that overtime compensation be paid on the regular payday for the period in which such workweek ends,” the suit states.

HRA, which is part of the Department of Social Services, is currently facing severe staffing shortages. DSS has a 20-percent vacancy rate, according to a November report from the city comptroller’s office. The shortages come at a time when more New Yorkers are seeking public benefits — the number of, according to the preliminary mayor’s management report.

The eligibility specialists “perform important work assisting NYC residents applying for public benefits. The sheer volume of clients they assist causes the Hinds plaintiffs to work before and after their scheduled shifts, and during their unpaid meal breaks,” said Diana J. Nobile, an attorney at McGillivary Steele Elkin representing the workers.

The lawsuit was filed Feb. 3 by the law firms of McGillivary Steele Elkin and Spivak Lipton. Because the city has the employees’ payroll records, the workers did not know the exact amount owed to them, according to the suit. The eligibility specialists are seeking “a complete and accurate accounting of all the compensation to which [they] are entitled,” back pay and interest for themselves as well as those similarly situated.

“We look forward to vindicating the Hinds plaintiffs’ entitlement to overtime pay in this case, and we are hopeful the City will do the right thing to make these workers whole,” Nobile said. “These employees go above and beyond to serve the City’s residents in need of assistance. At the very least, the City should do everything in its power to pay them what the law requires.”

HRA did not return a request for comment on the suit. A spokesperson for the city Law Department said that “we’ll review the case.”

Eligibility specialists are represented by District Council 37’s Local 1549, which was placed under administratorship by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees last September. 

"The city only pays for overtime if it has been pre-approved regardless of how many hours these hardworking employees put in to assist City residents. These employees should be paid for each and every minute of this critical overtime work. This lawsuit is to vindicate their rights," said AFSCME spokesperson Tracey Conaty.

Those who have worked as an eligibility specialist within the last three years can still sign onto the lawsuit on the local’s website.

The case is similar to a 2017 lawsuit brought by school safety agents, who said they were not compensated for work performed before starting their shifts, for travel between schools and during their meal periods. In 2020, the city agreed to pay $27.7 million to settle that suit, but did not admit any wrongdoing.

clewis@thechiefleader.com