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Posted by Ernestine Keller, Freedom, April 4, 2008:Our fiscal calendar year runs from Jan 1-Dec 31st . Our town meeting was the last week of March. We have several new people that is now getting Salary instead of hourly. When I figure out their Salary- do I take what has been paid since Jan 1st - March 31st subtract it out, then divide by the remaining 39 weeks to get my total?

Responses: I guess my first question Ernestine is whether the change from salary to hourly is appropriate.  There are very specific requirements which an employee must meet in order to be eligible for "salary" treatment under the Fair Labor Standards Act.  Of the 50 +/- full-time, part-time, & call personnel we have, only 7 of us meet that criteria - 5 of which are the Selectmen.  Elected officials do, but hired personnel find it more difficult to meet those criteria.  Second question, was the salary set for the fiscal year?  If yes, then you can do the computation as you stated in your email.  Or you can compute what they should have been paid for the 1st quarter, subtract what they were paid & provide them with a "make-up" check. (Barbara Cox, Milford)

I presume that the salaried individuals are elected officials. Our elected term of service year does not coincide with our fiscal year either. Our Selectmen, elected assessors, appointed health officer ($100), road commissioner ($500), Code Enforcement Officer, fire chief ($1,200), and me are paid a salary.

The CEO and I are the only ones with a significant salary. The payment for those is split out over 26 or 27 pay periods and coincide with the fiscal year. Our appointments also coincide with the fiscal year. I pay the elected officials twice a year (once just before property taxes are due, and once just before the annual town meeting where at least one is up for election/replacement. The health officer and fire chief get their pay in one lump sum in October. Both of these dates occur during the fiscal year (October/March, fiscal year is July to June).

I am assuming that maybe you might have a position such as Road Commissioner that might be elected in March and the town meeting sets his salary at some figure. If his term runs from March to March, and you pay weekly, you would take that salary and divide it by 52 or 53 (depending on how many pay periods there would be), and pay him that salary weekly. When the end of December hits, you've paid the person 39-weeks, but you still owe him a quarter of a year come January of next year. You would pay him weekly until town meeting again at the agreed upon salary rate for the town meeting approved amount, and when the next town meeting selects a road commissioner and sets a salary, I would start paying at that new rate. You get some overlap, but you have no authorization other than the salary amount set at town meeting to pay any more. That's one of the problems of having a town budget approved after the new fiscal year has started. I don't know if you have a charter or ordinance that allows operation after the fiscal year ends and before a new budget is approved, but that might be helpful.

Just a note on salaries…..Barbara is correct on the FSLA. The positions mentioned for fire chief, health officer and road commissioner are basically retainers. None is on a contract, and as long as we're not requiring them to work a set number of hours for less than minimum wage, we should be OK. I'm no expert on payroll matters and ours is a very small town. (Stu Marckoon, Lamoine)