Thousands of Georgia bus drivers, cafeteria workers and private school teachers, who this year were denied usual summertime unemployment checks, may get that money after all, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.
State Labor Commissioner Mark Butler instituted the benefits change on Jan. 30. He said it was unfair for contractual workers to receive seasonal benefits when public school system employees don't.
Washington officials determined last week that the Georgia Department of Labor violated workplace laws by refusing to pay the benefits. In an Aug. 2 letter obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the federal government ordered Butler to rescind the ruling and pay the teachers and contract workers for the weeks, or months, of lost unemployment benefits.
The payments — potentially millions of dollars — would come from businesses and/or taxpayers.
Butler met Monday in Atlanta with Teamsters Local 728 and other union and community leaders representing thousands of affected workers. He was granted a month's reprieve by the U.S. Labor Department to seek legal guidance from Georgia's attorney general.
By then, though, Washington expects the state to begin repaying workers such as Everton Daswell, a shuttle bus driver at Kennesaw State University whose summertime unemployment compensation claims were denied.
"If the [U.S. Labor Department's] ruling stands, then I say justice has been done," said Daswell, who works for a private company that contracts with the university. Daswell, out of full-time work since April, expects roughly $3,000 in lost benefits.
"Four months of bills have not been paid on time," he continued. "I couldn't look forward to any vacation. It affected our lives greatly."
In the early 1970s, Washington ruled that public school teachers, whose salaries are typically paid out over 12 months, weren't eligible for benefits during summer breaks. Teachers, who expect to be back at work in the fall, aren't considered laid-off — the main criteria to receive unemployment benefits.
Commissioner Butler, though, said public school teachers last year cried foul, as had private pre-kindergarten administrators whose unemployment insurance costs rise with each jobless claim. If a worker is approved for benefits, the pre-k provider is on the hook for additional unemployment insurance costs, which cut into slim profit margins.
"We were treating people employed directly by a public school system, or a university, differently than somebody who was contracted by a school system," Butler said in an interview Monday. "In cases where you have a great probability of returning to contracted work, then you're not eligible for unemployment."
The benefits change in January came as the state continued its push to trim jobless rolls and save money. Georgia's unemployment rate stood at 9 percent in June. The state owes Washington $743 million for jobless assistance borrowed during the recession.
In the Aug. 2 letter, the U.S. Labor Department wrote that Butler's "recent reinterpretation" of unemployment compensation is without "adequate statutory basis."
State Rep. Howard Maxwell, R-Dallas, a member of the House Insurance Committee, disagrees, adding that Butler "did the right thing." Paying benefits to seasonal workers is unfair to taxpayers and businesses that pay unemployment insurance, he said.
"Mr. Butler was doing what the majority of the people and legislators think is the right thing to do," Maxwell said.
It's impossible to determine how many Georgians could financially benefit if Washington's ruling withstands a challenge by Butler and state Attorney General Sam Olens. (Olens' office is "reviewing the matter," a spokeswoman said Monday.)
Labor departments don't track employment by occupation, so determining the seasonally jobless is imprecise. But the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics labeled 64,702 Georgians as private "educational service" workers last September, a category that includes teachers, assistants and other educators employed by private companies on contracts for public schools and universities.
Roughly 3,000 bus drivers, pre-k teachers, cafeteria workers, landscapers, janitors, crossing guards and other contractually employed Georgians applied for, and were denied, seasonal unemployment benefits this year. They could be eligible for weeks of benefits if the U.S. Labor Department's ruling stands. Seasonal workers who didn't apply for benefits may be eligible retroactively.
Angela Goddard, a fourth-grade teacher at Faith Christian Academy in Griffin, received summertime benefits the previous two summers. Not this year. She expected $250 in benefits weekly. Instead, Goddard borrowed $2,000 from her sister to cover the mortgage.
Monday, though, she was "crying tears of joy. This is a blessing, and what we've prayed for all summer."
Unions, Jobs With Justice and other groups representing seasonally laid-off workers will rally Tuesday morning outside the Labor Department's downtown Atlanta office.
