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November 28, 2008

Hanceville employees get back sick hours

By Patrick McCreless

To Hanceville Mayor Kenneth Nail, an injustice against the city’s employees has been corrected.

“It was absolutely wrong,” Nail said. “You don’t have people who earned their sick hours ... and then take those hours away.”

The Hanceville City Council unanimously approved an ordinance Tuesday to restore employee sick hours that were taken away during the previous administration. Council member Jo Ann Walls, who was part of the previous administration and the only member at that time to vote against the change, did not bother to hide her excitement on the policy reversal.

“I’m so happy,” Walls said with a large smile on her face.

Hanceville street department employee Keith Haynes said he and his fellow employees never learned why they lost some of their sick hours.

“They never did give us a reason,” Haynes said. “Before the change took place, they just sent us a memo that we were losing sick hours.”

Neither Walls nor former council member Hubert Jones could remember why the policy was changed.

Nail said city employees were once able to build up a total of 500 hours for sick leave. He said the previous administration however, changed the policy so that employees could only build up a total of 120 hours of sick leave.

“The problem was that they had employees who had earned between 200 and 300 hours,” Nail said.

He said those extra hours were basically taken away.

“I just thought it was ridiculous ... to have someone come in there and chop it (hours) down,” Nail said. “It’s fine to change policy, but you should start with new employees.”

Under the new ordinance, along with receiving lost sick hours, city employees can again earn a total of 500 hours of sick time.

“Employees will accrue 8 hours a month for sick time,” Nail said. “You’ve got to take care of your employees.”



‰ Patrick McCreless can be contacted by e-mail at patrickm@cullmantimes.com or by telephone at 734-2131 ext. 270.

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