A. Sick Leave With Pay. Leave with pay is granted to a classified full-time, qualified unclassified full-time, or part-time classified employees for serious personal illness, pregnancy, or disability, or when an employee's child or spouse, or parent requires the personal attention of the employee because of a serious injury or illness as defined in the Family and Medical Leave Act.
1. Regular full-time and part-time classified employees begin to accrue sick leave at date of hire. Regular full-time employees accrue sick leave at the rate of 3.70 hours per pay period, while firefighters (2,756 annual hours) and police officers assigned to patrol division (2,236 annual hours), if Section K exemption implemented by city commission, accrue 5.54 hours per pay period. Part-time classified employees shall accrue sick leave at the rate of 1.85 hours per pay period as long as they have worked at least twenty hours per week during the pay period.
2. Regular full-time employees may accrue a maximum of five hundred seventy-six hours, while firefighters may accrue a maximum of eight hundred sixty-four hours.
3. Classified employees shall be paid for sick leave hours in excess of four hundred eighty hours, seven hundred twenty hours for firefighters, in December of each year or upon separation of employment.
4. Sick leave is not granted in advance of accrual.
5. There shall be no pay for sick leave upon resignation, lay-off, or involuntary dismissal, except after five years of continuous employment, employees are entitled to accrued sick leave at the termination of their employment for any reason.
6. Temporary and casual employees do not accrue sick leave.
7. Any employee making a false claim for sick leave or who refuses to be examined by a physician may be dismissed.
8. Sick leave for three days or more must be supported by the certification of a licensed physician.
9. Planned use of sick leave must be reported to the department head as much in advance as possible.
10. In the case of an extended illness, an employee may apply accrued annual leave or compensatory time to sick leave.
B. Sick Leave for Retiring Employees. All retiring employees whose age and years of service equals eighty-six shall be paid for all accrued sick leave at the time of retirement. All other retiring employees, who are at least sixty-two years, shall receive a partial payment for accrued sick leave based on a proportion of the age plus years of service. For example, if age and years of service total seventy-eight, then the employee shall receive pay for ninety-one percent of the accrued sick leave.
C. Physical Examination. The city may request that an employee have a medical examination when it appears to the department head that the employee cannot perform the essential functions of his position, when a pattern of sick leave develops, or when an employee advises the department head that he cannot perform his job for medical reasons. The city shall pay for the examination. An employee who refuses to be examined by a physician designated by the city shall not receive sick leave pay for the claimed period of absence and may be dismissed. Employees who cannot perform the essential functions of their positions shall be terminated if reasonable accommodation creates an undue hardship or if the employee poses a safety threat to other city employees, the public, or to himself
D. Reporting Sick Leave. Sick leave shall be reported to the employee's supervisor by the employee or an immediate family member on a daily basis and as soon as possible but no later than one-half hour after the beginning of the employee's work shift unless the nature of the illness requires extended leave certified by the employee's physician and of which the employee's supervisor has been notified.
E. Use of Sick Leave During Probationary Period. Probationary employees accrue sick leave. Use of sick leave must be approved by the employee's supervisor on a day-by-day basis during the probationary period.
F. Donation of Leave Time for Nonwork-Related Serious Injury or Illness. City employees who have accumulated annual leave time under Section 2.92.600 or sick leave time under this section may, but are not required or urged to, donate the time to other city employees. Such donations shall be made under the terms and conditions specified below:
1. Nonprobationary city employees who have accumulated more than forty hours of annual leave may donate up to sixteen hours of that annual leave time to other nonprobationary city employees who have exhausted all annual leave, sick leave, or compensatory time due to a n on work-related serious injury or illness.
2. The employee in need of donated time must make a request for such time in writing to the city manager, who shall inform city employees of the request.
3. Donations of time shall be made on forms provided by the city, signed by the donating employee and witnessed by the department head. Donations of time shall be in hourly increments. The receiving employee shall be paid at his hourly rate of pay for donated time, not at the donor's rate.
4. Donated time accrues to the employee receiving the donation and no time shall be returned, if not used. Under no circumstances shall time donated to any employee exceed the maximum time allowed under subsection A of this section.
5. Donations of time are completely voluntary. No employee, supervisor, or elected official shall demand the donation of time from any employee, although a request from an employee may be communicated to other employees either orally or by written notice.
6. Terminated employees are ineligible to receive donations.
7. No right of donation is created in any employee, regardless of circumstance.
(Ord. 567 (part), 2019: Ord. 549, 2016; Ord. 532 (part), 2014; Ord. 435 § 10.5, 2001)