As Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney (D) proposes widely unpopular increases on property taxes and additional duties on cigarettes, city taxpayers are now criticizing the fact that Virginia’s capital city is refusing to release information regarding personnel overtime pay, some of which boggles the mind. With Richmonders wondering exactly where their tax money is going, considering over 60 percent of the city’s roads are in “poor” condition and the state of its public school division is in shambles, citizens are now cross with the growing lack of transparency.
Recently, WTVR requested information on how much money city employees each make in overtime compared to neighboring counties Henrico and Chesterfield. In receiving the fiscal figures via a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, Henrico and Chesterfield quickly obliged, however, the City of Richmond outright refused to participate.
Even though Richmond can decline to release the information due to the fact that the law does not mandate the disclosure of an individual personnel’s overtime pay, the law does not say the figures may not be released.
Taxpayers throughout Richmond are not very happy with City Hall after the refusal, even more so following the release of a city audit from January that found that some city personnel are racking up overtime hours that seem to not make sense.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported that an employee with the Department of Public Utilities (DPU) was paid for nearly 1,900 hours of overtime in 2017.
Based on a 40-hour work week, the time worked for an entire year equals 2,080 hours. With the 1,889 hours of overtime for which the City of Richmond paid the DPU employee, that would mean the employee worked an additional 36.3 hours per week. This alleged 76.3-hour work week would mean that the DPU employee would work nearly 11 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, without a single day off throughout the year, which is quite improbable.
Furthermore, the audit found that in 2017, 57 city employees received more than 700 hours of overtime pay, ranging all the way up to the aforementioned 1,889 hours of overtime. The audit also found that no supporting documentation was provided for 20 percent of overtime payments the auditor’s office researched.
Second District City Councilwoman Kim Gray sent a letter to Mayor Stoney last week asking that he release the overtime numbers, but has yet to receive a response. She also asked City Attorney Allen Jackson why City Hall declined to release this information, and was reportedly told that they were concerned about the information being tied to identifiable individuals.
However, WTVR relays that their FOIA request included only positions, base pay, and overtime, not individual names.
Regardless, the lack of transparency for city employee overtime seems to be on par with the other mishandled departments and project in the city, like the Richmond Public Schools (RPS) budget.