Charlie Harles Shares Answers to RFW Members Most Frequent Issues
Charlie Harles is an attorney in Washington, DC who has spent most of his 30+ year career working on legal, legislative and policy issues of interest to Community Rehabilitation Programs (CRPs). Mr. Harles has been General Counsel of Goodwill Industries International and Associate Executive Director of the National Association of Rehabilitation Facilities. Since 1989 he has been the principal of Harles & Associates. He is also Executive Director of the Inter-National Association of Business, Industry and Rehabilitation.
Of particular interest to RFW members is access to Harles & Associates for federal wage-hour issues. Mr. Harles is a recognized expert on the special wage-hour issues faced by community rehabilitation programs. These issues can be very difficult and Mr. Harles has been able to assist many RFW members. Through an arrangement between Harles & Associates and RFW, RFW members can obtain consultation with Mr. Harles through telephone calls and e-mails (30 minute limit per organization).
The U.S. Department of Labor has increased its scrutiny of employers who use the special wages for persons with disabilities. Congress has also taken notice and there have been some negative stories in the press. CRPs need to make sure they are in full compliance with the rules and regulations in this area. Mr. Harles noted that he has had to represent several CRP's in 2006 who were originally told they would have to pay back wages of up to $400,000 for violations involving workers with disabilities. Mr. Harles was able to obtain settlements of much less than the original assessments (up to 90% reductions), but there were still substantial back wage payments and in one case it did become an issue for a local newspaper. None of these cases were in Wisconsin. Mr. Harles said that the most common problem leading to such back wages was staff who were not adequately trained in wage-hour compliance. In several cases, staff did not know what to do or how to do it. In three cases this year, a CRP had "forgotten" to apply for a renewal of their special 14(c) certificate.
RFW members and other CRP's have gone to Harles & Associates with a variety of questions and concerns. Some of the most common issues include:
- Obtaining accurate prevailing rates from community businesses: Many CRP's have trouble with this because no businesses do the kind of work they do or have people do it the way they do. Harles & Associates has been able to show many CRP's how they can use other jobs that have similar skill level, experience requirements or educational level to get valid prevailing rates.
- Measuring productivity for hourly paid workers: The CRP may be interested in a variety of training and rehabilitation measures for the workers with disabilities, but the Department of Labor will only let "quantity and quality" of work to be used to determine productivity. Behaviorial factors cannot be used to reduce pay. Harles & Associates has been able to show RFW members and other CRP's how to develop procedures and forms for measuring and documenting productivity for people who will be paid as hourly workers.
- Travel time: Questions often arise as what travel time has to be paid work time and what rate to use. Workers with disabilities do not have to be paid for their "commuting" at the beginning and end of the day as long as the transportation being provided by the CRP is for the convenience of the workers and is not required. Travel time between work sites must be paid and if the worker works to help load or unload a van or bus at the beginning or end of the day then that time and the related travel time must be paid. Travel time should be paid at the average hourly rate they earned working in that week or quarter.
- Down time: CRP's are often faced with situations where there is not sufficient work for the disabled workers. If they were a regular community for-profit employer they would have to pay the workers until they were completely relieved from their work and were free to leave the premises. CRP's usually cannot let disabled workers leave the facility. In order not to have to pay them, they must relieve them from work and provide some alternative, non-work related activities. The U.S. Department of Labor says that the person must go to a non-work area if they are not to be paid. CRP's sometimes face situations where that might not be possible given the physical limitation of the building. CRP's have the burden of showing that they did the best they could do to comply with DOL guidelines.
- Disabled for the job: It is not enough to show that the person had a physical or mental disability and they had less than normal productivity in order to pay them a special minimum wage. The CRP has to be able to show what was it about the person's disability which caused the lack of productivity for the work they were doing. The CRP must be able to document not only the disability, but its relationship to productivity. Disabling conditions such as mental illness and learning disabilities can be especially difficult to provide this level of documentation.
RFW members also are entitled to purchase the Harles & Associates "Federal Wage-Hour Guide for Service Providers to Persons with Disabilities" at a 25% discount. The Guide is $75 rather than the list price of $100. Shipping and handling is an additional $8.00 for priority mail. Harles & Associates also periodically provides training on behalf of RFW.
Charlie Harles
Harles & Associates
POB 15318
Washington, DC 20003
202.546.2847
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