New College Independent Alumni/ae Association

Dear colleagues,

I know that many of you have wage claims against New College pending before the Department of Labor Standards Enforcement. I know that many of you may have already had your claims heard, but for those of you who haven’t, I thought I would share my experience today.

New College is not disputing the wage claims themselves (though in a written statement Colleen O’Neal said that there are some cases where they are disputing amounts). They are, however, disputing the 30-day penalties incurred under the relevant labor law for failure to meet payroll. The basis for this argument is that failure to pay was not “willful”; i.e., they wanted to pay, but couldn’t. This argument has no legal basis because New College admits to owing wages (to see the legal definition of “willful”, click on http://www.dir.ca.gov/t8/13520.html).

The DLSE representative explained that each claim would be considered individually, and that we had the option of expediting our claims by asking only for salary owed instead of salary plus penalty. The initial hearings would happen quickly if there was no dispute, but if there was disagreement about the amount owed or if the employee asked for the penalty, the employee would have to wait for a hearing later that day. There was no pressure to settle for less than what was owed except for the exigencies of waiting several hours for a hearing.

There is concern among faculty and staff that New College doesn’t have the necessary assets to pay everyone what is owed, and many people believe that if they don’t settle for less money, they will have to settle for none. Therefore many faculty have chosen to ask only for salary owed. This is a personal choice, and I understand and support everyone in their individual decision-making calculus. However, I wanted to let folks know that as an adjunct teaching independent study (claiming $548 in back pay plus the 30-day penalty) the representatives from New College at first tried to refuse to pay the penalty, and then offered to pay half. When I asked for the full amount, the DLSE rep told them that if it came to a hearing, they would have to pay the full penalty. Due to the small nature of my claim and therefore the small penalty, the reps from New College then decided to pay me the full amount owed including the penalty without making me wait for a hearing.

New College has 30 days to pay claims in full. If they fail to do so, DLSE will contact the plaintiff with information on how to proceed with the claim.

Since, as adjuncts, many of you are likely to be making small claims, I wanted to share information that might help you make your decision. Please pass this along to anyone you know — faculty, staff, or students owed work study wages — who has a claim pending later this week.

I wish all of you the best of luck.

–faculty correspondent

Trackback URI | Comments RSS