Sec. 25-12.11. Catastrophic Leave.
a. Purpose.The purpose of this section is to provide a method for employees to assist fellow employees who have exhausted their leave time due to a catastrophic illness or injury of the employee or his or her immediate family member. It is not the intent of this section for any employee to enrich him or herself, but to aid only those employees that are truly in need of assistance. All eligible employees, as defined in Section 25-12.11(b)(1) are covered under this policy.
b. Definitions.
1.Eligible Employee – to be eligible to receive surrendered catastrophic leave the employee must meet all the following criteria:
a.Be an active full-time or regular part-time employee.
b.Have exhausted all leave balances and applied for leave without pay due to the catastrophic illness or injury of the employee or the employee’s immediate family member.
c.Have provided the required documentation to verify a catastrophic illness or injury of the employee, or the employee’s immediate family member.
d.Immediate family member includes a spouse, registered domestic partner, child, or parent. For purposes of this section, the definitions contained in Labor Code section 233 for “child” and “parent” shall apply.
2.Catastrophic Illness or Injury – a life threatening or debilitating illness or injury that is expected to incapacitate the employee, or an employee’s immediate family member that requires the employee to be absent from work, for an extended period of time and which creates a financial hardship because the employee has exhausted all of his or her accumulated leave. The illness or injury must be anticipated to extend for longer than sixty (60) calendar days in a twelve (12) month period, as certified by a medical doctor.
c. General.
1.Employees may surrender to the City of Monterey accrued vacation, holiday or compensatory time (but not sick leave) to be used by an approved eligible employee. Surrendered leave will be converted to sick leave and added to the approved eligible employee’s sick leave balance.
2.The recipient employee’s use of surrendered leave time must not cause the employee to receive compensation in excess of their gross regular pay. The recipient employee may receive compensation from the Salary Continuation Program, Workers’ Compensation, Long-term Disability, State Disability, Social Security, or other income replacement sources so long as money received does not exceed 100% of gross regular pay when combined with the donated leave pay. If a qualifying injury/illness is later found to be qualified industrial injury/illness, the recipient employee will be required to repay all money received under this program which would result in pay in excess of 100% of gross regular pay for the period in question. Any such excess will then be reimbursed as leave to the employees who originally surrendered the leave. The recipient employee may be required to sign an agreement prior to receipt of any funds under this program consenting to repayment pursuant to this policy, or consenting to a lien upon any Workers Compensation award as a condition of receipt of these funds.
3.The recipient employee must have exhausted all available leave time prior to using surrendered leave; however, the approval to receive surrendered leave may be made prior to the anticipated date leave balances will be exhausted. Prior to program participation, the recipient employee, recipient employee’s family, other person designated in writing by the recipient employee, or the recipient employee’s department head must submit a written request, using the “Catastrophic Leave Application Form.”
4.Medical verification, including work-related prognosis, must be provided by the recipient employee to the Human Resources Director (Ord 3385; 02/07). This verification must be signed by the treating physician. The recipient employee will be required to authorize the release of medical records to the treating physician or physician selected by the City for a second opinion to verify that the qualifying illness or injury is anticipated to extend for longer than sixty (60) days in any twelve (12) month period. The Human Resources Director (Ord 3385; 02/07) may consult with the treating physician(s) or other qualified medical providers and may require the employee to submit to a second opinion from a City designated physician to determine if an illness or injury is “catastrophic” as defined by this policy. The determination by the City designated physician of whether or not an illness or injury is catastrophic will be final and binding and not subject to grievance procedures. All information will remain confidential. The City may require periodic medical verification of the employee’s catastrophic illness or injury to determine continued eligibility for this program.
5.A recipient employee is eligible to receive a maximum of 1000 hours of surrendered leave time for the employee’s catastrophic illness or injury incident, and a maximum of 480 hours for an employee’s immediate family member’s catastrophic illness or injury incident; however, the initial receipt of leave time is limited to 100 hours. Once the recipient’s sick leave balance drops to 50 hours then an additional surrendered leave can be added to the recipient’s account up to the 100-hour limit.
6.Surrender of vacation, holiday and compensatory time are to be made as follows: two-hour minimum, additional amounts can be surrendered in one-hour increments. Once the leave surrender has been processed, it is irrevocable (subject to the exceptions found in Section 2 above and Section 10 below).
7.Surrendered leave time will be calculated on a dollar for dollar basis. The value of the surrendered time will be calculated at the surrendering employee’s regular rate of pay, then converted to hours of sick leave at the recipient’s regular rate of pay to the nearest hour to determine the number of hours of sick leave available to the recipient.
8.Names of participants and amounts of leave surrendered will be maintained as strictly confidential. Application to surrender leave will be done in writing using the attached “Confidential Leave Surrender Request Form.” This form will be picked up in the Personnel Office and submitted to the Personnel Office for processing. It may not be handed out or processed at the department level.
9.Unused sick leave hours remaining in the recipient’s leave bank when the recipient employee returns to work with the City will be retained by the recipient and will follow normal sick leave balance provisions of the applicable MOU and/or personnel rules.
10.If, however, the recipient employee separates from employment as a result of the illness or injury for which the donation was received instead of returning to work, any sick leave balance remaining will not be reportable to PERS under the sick leave service credit program and will not be payable to the employee or the employee’s estate. Such remaining sick leave balance will be transferred back on a pro-rata basis to the employee(s) who surrendered the leave as the original type of donated leave (i.e. vacation, compensatory time).
11.This is a voluntary program and no employee may be required to surrender leave.
12.Eligible employees who participate in this program and receive surrendered paid leave may be subject to the terms and requirements of the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), other laws, leave policies, rules or regulations. This program is to run concurrently with other leave programs.
13.The City reserves the right to retire or separate an employee from service and/or take any other personnel action regardless of this policy or leave time balances held by an employee. (Ord. 3486 § 2, 2013; Ord. 3483 § 2, 2013; Ord. 3314, 2002)