Chicago Police officers denied their requests to take compensatory time off could be in line for damages at a time when the city is strapped for cash, thanks to a federal appeals court ruling this week.
Denying the city's appeal, the 7th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that the Police Department can no longer cite manpower shortages to indefinitely deny requests from rank-and-file officers to use comp time awarded in lieu of overtime pay.
The Fair Labor Standards Act requires the city to grant comp time requests made with sufficient notice, even if it means calling other officers in on their days off to fill the void. The act applies to time earned above and beyond 11 overtime hours in a four-week period.
What price do you put on missing family birthdays, reunions, baseball games, etc. Mastercard calls them "priceless" and we tend to agree.
But what seems to be missing from this entire article is why would the Department feel the need to deny officers time off that they earned unless the Districts and Watches are so undermanned that they can't put up the cars and officers they need to maintain operations?
The facade continues to crumble, and the media continues to ignore the increasingly obvious fact that we are shorthanded, dangerously shorthanded, and will continue to be for the foreseeable future.
But what seems to be missing from this entire article is why would the Department feel the need to deny officers time off that they earned unless the Districts and Watches are so undermanned that they can't put up the cars and officers they need to maintain operations?
The facade continues to crumble, and the media continues to ignore the increasingly obvious fact that we are shorthanded, dangerously shorthanded, and will continue to be for the foreseeable future.
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