SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The California Supreme Court ruled Thursday that employers are under no obligation to ensure that workers take legally mandated lunch breaks in a case that affects thousands of businesses and millions of workers.
The unanimous opinion came after workers' attorneys argued that abuses are routine and widespread when companies aren't required to issue direct orders to take the breaks. They claimed employers take advantage of workers who don't want to leave colleagues during busy times.
The case was initially filed nine years ago against Dallas-based Brinker International, the parent company of Chili's and other eateries, by restaurant workers complaining of missed breaks in violation of California labor law.
But the high court sided with businesses when it ruled that requiring companies to order breaks is unmanageable and that those decisions should be left to workers. The decision provided clarity that businesses had sought regarding the law.
The opinion written by Associate Justice Kathryn Werdegar explained that state law does not compel an employer to ensure employees cease all work during meal periods. It stated that while employers are required to free workers of job duties for a 30-minute meal break, the employee is at liberty to use the time as they choose even if it's to work, she wrote.
"The employer is not obligated to police meal breaks and ensure no work thereafter is performed," Werdegar wrote.
Tracee Lorens, lead attorney for the plaintiffs, said she believed the court's decision still allowed some wiggle room for the case to get class-action certification on the meal break claims. Lorens said she was pleased the court did allow a separate claim regarding the plaintiffs' receiving proper rest breaks to proceed as a class-action.
Class-action lawsuits are brought by one or more plaintiffs on behalf of themselves and others facing the same circumstances, and can
include thousands of people in some cases.
Adam Hohnbaum, a former Chili's bartender and server in Encinitas, Calif., who worked for the chain for about six years, said he was pleased with the court's decision allowing at least the rest break aspect of the suit to move forward.
"Most of the time you didn't get a break or a rest period at all, it just wasn't a part of the daily operation," Hohnbaum said.
Hohnbaum hoped the attention paid to the issue would improve working conditions for current employees.
It was unclear whether the opinion would reduce or increase future class-action lawsuits on the issue because the court did not dismiss the meal break violation claim by workers but instead sent it back to be reargued in trial courts.
Lorens said she will argue to the lower court that Brinker's company meal break policies still violate state wage-and-hour laws, even though the court said employers do not have to police when those breaks are taken.
Roger Thomson, executive vice president and general counsel of Brinker, applauded the court's decision on what he thought was the key issue: whether employers must ensure workers take their breaks.
"That was the biggest issue to us," Thomson said. "It has been allowed for our team members to work through lunch if they want or take the time off instead, and this ruling allows our team members that flexibility," he said.
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Showing posts with label school. Show all posts
Showing posts with label school. Show all posts
Friday, April 13, 2012
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Cop goes undercover to bust California students
By TRACIE CONE
Associated Press
EXETER, Calif. -- On his second trip through high school, former C-student Alex Salinas got a lot of A's.
He was 22, however, and an undercover narcotics officer going by the name Johnny Ramirez. When his first semester progress report showed a 3.25 average, the baby-faced police rookie made a mental note: Stop turning in homework assignments.
Eight months later, the ruse was up, and Exeter, a bucolic citrus-growing community in California's Central Valley, was turned on its ear after a school-day police sweep ended with a dozen Exeter High students in custody on drug charges.
Some people wondered how the deception by Salinas could have gone on for so long in the small town of just 10,000 people. Others lamented that the problems of the big city had come to the quaint community of antique shops and historic murals set amid a stunning backdrop of the snow-capped Sierra Nevada.
"It's amazing we were able to keep a secret in this little town for that long," said Police Chief Cliff Bush, who had been searching for years for just the right officer to pull off the undercover ploy. "People in little towns tend to know everything about everybody."
Leading the campus sweep this month was the tall, lanky Salinas, dressed in the crisp black uniform and combat boots of the Exeter Police Department instead of the T-shirts and sneakers he had worn as Johnny Ramirez.
Still, there was no mistaking the boyish face and the wide smile gleaming with braces.
"A lot of jaws dropped when they saw me," Salinas said. "They knew me as that kid at school that they hung around with, and then the next thing they're in handcuffs and I'm in a uniform."
The sting got more attention from the media than a drug bust of 12 students normally would because of something the chief now laments: It happened the same week as the debut of the Hollywood comedy "21 Jump Street," which features - you got it - undercover cops fighting crime at a high school.
Chief Bush insisted it was not a case of life imitating art.
"A day or two later I became aware of the movie," Bush said. "The last thing I would do is check movie premieres. This just happened to coincide with the movie's release."
There had been no major complaints about drug dealing at the 1,000-student school that sits within sight of the police station, but Bush said he had been thinking for years about doing an undercover sting to send a message.
One day last summer, he ran into Salinas, who was weeks away from graduating from the police academy. Salinas had ridden along with Bush years earlier when the chief was still a patrolman.
Bush eventually approached Salinas with the plan. With it came a full-time job on the city's 17-member Police Department - an offer Salinas wouldn't refuse.
As Johnny Ramirez, Salinas attended Monarch football games and pep rallies. He purposely landed himself in detention so he could meet people outside of the four classes he attended before reporting each afternoon to the county drug task force headquarters for briefings and homework assignments. He made a Facebook page and forged friendships, which made the deception hard for him to bear.
"There were a few students I got to know who are good kids, and I did feel kind of bad for being their friend and then being something different," he said.
Only the principal, vice principal and Johnny's guidance counselor knew about the operation, school Superintendent Renee Whitson said.
"Even I didn't know the name he'd go by," she said.
Still, a moment of panic erupted on the first day of school last fall when a teacher pointed to the new kid and joked, "We've got a new narc on campus. They tell me he's wearing a green shirt." Johnny Ramirez's shirt was green.
Eventually students sold the new kid marijuana and cocaine, the prescription painkiller hydrocodone and the muscle relaxant Soma.
"There was certainly no celebration on the day of conclusion. It was a very sad day," Whitson said. "These are our students. We hope this is the necessary wakeup call to make this positive for their lives."
As the school year winds down, the arrested students are in the midst of review board hearings. Only three are older than 18, and one student's parents were also arrested for investigation of methamphetamine possession.
In the end, large quantities of drugs were not confiscated and none of the arrests involved trafficking significant quantities, though many purchases were for amounts that exceeded "personal use," Salinas said.
Was it worth keeping an officer off Exeter's streets and on a school campus for eight months?
Yes, Chief Bush said. But he is almost embarrassed that the undercover operation has garnered so much publicity, mostly because of his own bad timing regarding the release of "21 Jump Street."
"This is what I was trying to avoid, that we busted the local Scarface at the high school," Bush said, making reference to another Hollywood movie, this one about a drug kingpin. "Turns out they were just tiny amounts, but if you've got just one kid dealing drugs at school, that's too many."
The chief hopes the arrests have a lasting impact on all students, though he does realize he might have created a problem of another kind in Exeter.
"I'd hate to be the new kid at school next year," he said. "They won't make very many friends."
Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/03/28/4371921/cop-goes-undercover-to-bust-california.html#storylink=cpy
Associated Press
EXETER, Calif. -- On his second trip through high school, former C-student Alex Salinas got a lot of A's.
He was 22, however, and an undercover narcotics officer going by the name Johnny Ramirez. When his first semester progress report showed a 3.25 average, the baby-faced police rookie made a mental note: Stop turning in homework assignments.
Eight months later, the ruse was up, and Exeter, a bucolic citrus-growing community in California's Central Valley, was turned on its ear after a school-day police sweep ended with a dozen Exeter High students in custody on drug charges.
Some people wondered how the deception by Salinas could have gone on for so long in the small town of just 10,000 people. Others lamented that the problems of the big city had come to the quaint community of antique shops and historic murals set amid a stunning backdrop of the snow-capped Sierra Nevada.
"It's amazing we were able to keep a secret in this little town for that long," said Police Chief Cliff Bush, who had been searching for years for just the right officer to pull off the undercover ploy. "People in little towns tend to know everything about everybody."
Leading the campus sweep this month was the tall, lanky Salinas, dressed in the crisp black uniform and combat boots of the Exeter Police Department instead of the T-shirts and sneakers he had worn as Johnny Ramirez.
Still, there was no mistaking the boyish face and the wide smile gleaming with braces.
"A lot of jaws dropped when they saw me," Salinas said. "They knew me as that kid at school that they hung around with, and then the next thing they're in handcuffs and I'm in a uniform."
The sting got more attention from the media than a drug bust of 12 students normally would because of something the chief now laments: It happened the same week as the debut of the Hollywood comedy "21 Jump Street," which features - you got it - undercover cops fighting crime at a high school.
Chief Bush insisted it was not a case of life imitating art.
"A day or two later I became aware of the movie," Bush said. "The last thing I would do is check movie premieres. This just happened to coincide with the movie's release."
There had been no major complaints about drug dealing at the 1,000-student school that sits within sight of the police station, but Bush said he had been thinking for years about doing an undercover sting to send a message.
One day last summer, he ran into Salinas, who was weeks away from graduating from the police academy. Salinas had ridden along with Bush years earlier when the chief was still a patrolman.
Bush eventually approached Salinas with the plan. With it came a full-time job on the city's 17-member Police Department - an offer Salinas wouldn't refuse.
As Johnny Ramirez, Salinas attended Monarch football games and pep rallies. He purposely landed himself in detention so he could meet people outside of the four classes he attended before reporting each afternoon to the county drug task force headquarters for briefings and homework assignments. He made a Facebook page and forged friendships, which made the deception hard for him to bear.
"There were a few students I got to know who are good kids, and I did feel kind of bad for being their friend and then being something different," he said.
Only the principal, vice principal and Johnny's guidance counselor knew about the operation, school Superintendent Renee Whitson said.
"Even I didn't know the name he'd go by," she said.
Still, a moment of panic erupted on the first day of school last fall when a teacher pointed to the new kid and joked, "We've got a new narc on campus. They tell me he's wearing a green shirt." Johnny Ramirez's shirt was green.
Eventually students sold the new kid marijuana and cocaine, the prescription painkiller hydrocodone and the muscle relaxant Soma.
"There was certainly no celebration on the day of conclusion. It was a very sad day," Whitson said. "These are our students. We hope this is the necessary wakeup call to make this positive for their lives."
As the school year winds down, the arrested students are in the midst of review board hearings. Only three are older than 18, and one student's parents were also arrested for investigation of methamphetamine possession.
In the end, large quantities of drugs were not confiscated and none of the arrests involved trafficking significant quantities, though many purchases were for amounts that exceeded "personal use," Salinas said.
Was it worth keeping an officer off Exeter's streets and on a school campus for eight months?
Yes, Chief Bush said. But he is almost embarrassed that the undercover operation has garnered so much publicity, mostly because of his own bad timing regarding the release of "21 Jump Street."
"This is what I was trying to avoid, that we busted the local Scarface at the high school," Bush said, making reference to another Hollywood movie, this one about a drug kingpin. "Turns out they were just tiny amounts, but if you've got just one kid dealing drugs at school, that's too many."
The chief hopes the arrests have a lasting impact on all students, though he does realize he might have created a problem of another kind in Exeter.
"I'd hate to be the new kid at school next year," he said. "They won't make very many friends."
Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/03/28/4371921/cop-goes-undercover-to-bust-california.html#storylink=cpy
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Move by Lodi Unified official signals curriculum transition
By Keith Reid
Record Staff Writer
March 23, 2012 12:00 AM
LODI - Lodi Unified School District Assistant Superintendent of Secondary Education Odie Douglas filed a request for reassignment last week, opening a window for the district to transition into a new philosophical mind-set at the high school level under new leadership.
Douglas, 54, was hired in Lodi Unified seven years ago as associate superintendent - second in command to then-Superintendent Bill Huyett. He has worked much of this time introducing a new level of "academic rigor" in Lodi Unified high schools under an all-college preparation model, meaning all students are enrolled in the courses colleges want to see on transcripts.
The Board of Trustees has declared recently that the district is to transition from an all college-prep model to the introduction of more career and technical education courses for students who believe a trade school or the work force is more likely to fill their needs than college readiness.
Douglas will be reassigned in July. The job he moves to could be within Lodi Unified, but Douglas said he has an open mind.
"I am looking forward to a new opportunity," Douglas said. "It's known that I've been pursuing a superintendency. I am going to continue searching for new opportunities."
Douglas was a finalist for Stockton Unified's superintendent search in 2010 before the district decided to hire the retired Carl Toliver on a two-year contract. Douglas also interviewed for the top spot in the Natomas Unified School District.
Superintendent Cathy Nichols-Washer said Douglas submitted his letter requesting reassignment within his credential area. She said the district has posted the assistant superintendent job without any replacement candidates in mind.
The position will pay between $105,000 and $135,000 annually according to an online classified advertisement. Douglas, who has his doctorate degree, is earning $164,000 annually.
Douglas was one of several administrators who were "re-shuffled" into new positions in 2010 after Nichols-Washer pledged to streamline services at the district office to coincide with other layoffs and budget cuts. The associate superintendent's office was purged in that shuffle. Douglas stayed in the superintendent's cabinet as an assistant superintendent.
"(Douglas) has a wealth of experience and knowledge. He's a very good person and a good administrator," Nichols-Washer said. "He is always going to do very well."
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