Overtime ruling may cost Kimball County employers

Updated overtime regulations are meant to make the rules easy enough for everyone to understand and the final rule, announced on May 18, aims to put more money in the pockets of middle class workers or give them more free time.

These new rules will automatically extend overtime pay guards for more than four million American workers within the first year and positions that are currently exempt from overtime pay will be converted to non-exempt positions and become eligible for overtime pay.

To what end?

“This will have a negative impact on (Kimball) County’s budget,” Kimball County Clerk Cathy Sibal said.

Sibal added that she was unsure at this time how big the impact would be, but because the ruling doesn’t become effective until December 1, 2016, employers will have ample time to prepare for the change.

This newest ruling will raise the salary limit from $455 a week to $913 or $47,476 per year for up to 4.2 million workers in America. Additionally, the salary limits will be updated automatically every three years for salaried workers.

“We have received some guidance and thoughts from attorneys (on this subject),” Kimball Public School Superintendent, Marshall Lewis said. “We are currently discussing the options, including base conversations with those that may be impacted.”

“Overall I don’t think that this will have a wide-sweeping impact on Kimball Public Schools,” continued Lewis, “and I think that there are great options out there. Our first goal is to continue to treat our employees well (both those affected and those not affected by the legal issues), and the second goal is to meet the expectation of the law.”

No response was received from City Administrator Daniel Ortiz on the subject of the new ruling as it may or may not affect City employees.

Facts from the United State Department of Labor

- This ruling will raise the salary threshhold from $455 to $913 per week, or up to $47,476 annually.

- This change goes into effect on December 1, 2016

- The Presidential Memorandum, signed by President Barack Obama in 2014, updates the Fair Labor Standard Act regulations defining which white collar workers are protected by the minimum wage and overtime standards.

- The final ruling updated salary and compensation exemption levels for executive, administrative and professional workers.

- The final rule sets the standard salary level at the 40th percentile of earnings of a full-time salaried worker in the lowest-wage census region, which is currently the south.

- This ruling also sets the total annual compensation requirement for highly compensated employees (HCE) subject to a minimal duties test to the annual equivalent of the 90th percentile of full-time salaried workers nationally ($134,004); and will establish a mechanism for automatically updating the salary and compensation levels every three years to maintain the levels at the above percentiles and to ensure that they continue to provide useful and effective tests for exemption.