CNB Archives 2009: Daily Newspaper Gives Some Ink to Gloucester City Municipal Clerk Being Fired
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
CNB ARCHIVES posted December 22, 2009
By William E. Cleary Sr.
The story about Gloucester City’s Municipal Clerk Paul Kain being fired was published in today’s Courier Post. Mayor and Council terminated his employment at the December 7th work session. Three days later ClearysNotebook reported that Kain was no longer employed by the City of Gloucester City. Likewise the story appeared in the December 17th Gloucester City News.
The story in the Courier and the one posted on CNB are basically the same. Although the Courier does have a quote from Mayor William James, who said,
"He ran out of his sick and vacation time, and also his FMLA time, and obviously we need a city clerk. He has not shown up to work since July 10."
Under state law, Family and Medical Leave Act time, which keeps job security and benefits intact during an extended period of emergency absence, kicked in automatically for Kain, a tenured employee. Kain did cite medical reasons for his absence, officials said, but he never provided the documentation required by FMLA.
"The attitude was to give Mr. Kain the benefit of the doubt," said city solicitor John Kearney, when asked why it took so long to fire the clerk.
Kain used up all his accumulated sick and vacation time, plus the FMLA time, by August. The three-person department had to handle the Nov. 3 election without him.
Comments
No FMLA is for 12 weeks only! Also, FMLA may run concurrent with sick and vacation time, it does not have to be used once you have exhausted all your accured time. Being that Mr. Kain is considered a Key Employee, under the FMLA he did not have to be granted such leave it could have been denied from the beginning.
You're right. I was very wrong in what I thought was permitted by FMLA. I lost a job because I was on intermittant FMLA due to my mother's terminal illness. Even though it was the law allowing it and granted by the company, the new manager said it was unacceptable. So, I'm very attentive when I see it on others' dismissals. But, 12 weeks is definitely far less than six months.
- See more at: http://www.gloucestercitynews.net/clearysnotebook/2009/12/daily-newspaper-gives-some-ink-to-municipal-clerk-being-fired.html#sthash.DQImdyjX.dpuf
I'm confused. Assuming Paul's illness is legitimate and documentation does exist, isn't FMLA supposed to be for up to SIX months? They say he hadn't appeared for work since July 10, yet he somehow used up all of his FMLA PLUS his sick and vacation leave in a month? Six months from July 10 isn't up until January. What kind of math are they using? Or is there a part of the story they're not telling?