Inquiry of the Week (2/12/01)

Question:

What overtime regulations apply to a city with a police chief and two full-time police officers?

Answer:

The provisions of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act do not apply because the city employs less than five law enforcement officers. The overtime regulations of the Federal Fair Labor Standards Act only apply to municipalities which employ five or more officers in their police department (civilian reserve officers do not count towards this total). Since the city does not employ this many officers, there are no federal overtime regulations that must be met by the city.

However, the city still is covered by the state regulations that apply to overtime. These regulations are contained in the Washington State Minimum Wage Law, Ch. 49.46 RCW. This Act does contain mandatory provisions regarding overtime pay for most city employees, including police.

However, the police chief is not covered by the provisions in the state Minimum Wage Act. There is an exemption in RCW 49.46.010(5)(l) for:

Any individual who holds a public elective or appointive office of the state, any county, city, town, municipal corporation or quasi-municipal corporation, political subdivision, or any instrumentality thereof, or any employee of the state legislature.

It is clear that the city police chief is an appointive officer of the city and so is exempt from the mandatory overtime regulations in state law as well as federal law. It is a matter of city policy whether and when to grant overtime or compensatory time to the police chief.

The two regular police officers of the city are covered by the overtime laws. The city must pay overtime to these police officers when they exceed the number of hours set out in state law regarding overtime. For most city personnel, the overtime laws apply when the employee works over forty hours in a week. However, state law does give the city more flexibility with regard to overtime for police officers (and fire fighters) than it does for other city personnel. The city can balance police officer's hours over a work period that is longer than one week or seven days. The work period cannot be less than seven consecutive days or more than twenty-eight days. RCW 49.46.130(2) provides that if the work week is twenty-eight days, no overtime compensation is required until the hours worked exceed two hundred and forty hours. If the work period is more than seven days, but less than twenty-eight days, no overtime compensation is required until the ratio between the number of days in the work period and the hours worked exceed the ratio between the work period of twenty-eight days and two hundred and forty hours.

In essence, state law appears to allow a city to establish a seven-day work period with a sixty-hour work week for city police without being required to pay overtime compensation. Any hours worked in excess of sixty hours in a week must be compensated at an overtime rate not less than one and one-half times the regular rate of pay for the officer.