Athens City Council adopted a fringe benefits package for non-union city workers Monday, including police, fire fighters and maintenance workers.
Compensatory time can now be used on vacation, clothing or sick leave of the worker or their family member. The new package will also instruct the city to pay out union and non-union workers at the end of each year for their comp time.
Previously, union members got paid out at the end of the year, but non-union members could let it accumulate, allowing them to wait to receive benefits until switching jobs or retiring.
Now comp time will be paid at the current rate they are making, if it is a higher rate than what they had when the comp time was earned.
The maximum amount of hours of paid comp time is set at 240 hours, even if a worker has more hours than that. The 240-hour limit will now be set yearly rather than a non-periodical amount of time.
The city will be paying out comp time to city workers before Black Friday.
This is all in an effort to save the city money, and most city workers agree with the provisions, City Auditor Kathy Hecht said.
“It’s not good for the city to carry out the comp time,” Hecht said. “This will take the liability off of their books.”
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