A former emergency management coordinator in southwest Iowa’s Shelby County has won an $860,000 settlement against the county’s Board of Supervisors and the County Emergency Management Agency.
Jason Wickizer was fired in 2019 after being named in an audit report and accused of improper payroll disbursements. His lawyer, Kellie Paschke, says Wickizer wasn’t a typical 9-to-5 worker. She says he was always on-call for natural and other emergency situations, plus, he had to cover dispatcher shifts when needed and that resulted in many hours of overtime.
Wickizer’s overtime hours were compensated for through either an overtime rate as an hourly employee or through “comp time,” allowing him to take time off at a later date.
When Wickizer discovered he wasn’t being compensated on a time-and-and-a-half basis for comp time, he began to question why he wasn’t receiving that on a regular basis.
The suit alleged the defendants knowingly and intentionally failed to compensate Wickizer for his labor, services and paid leave. While an audit was conducted, Paschke says the auditing firm failed to include Wickizer’s comp time in its analysis.
Paschke says, “It’s incredibly frustrating that Jason’s good name has been dragged through the mud in the community, all because somebody had a bone to pick with how much he worked, apparently.” The settlement included more than $58,000 in wages, in addition to damages for physical injury, emotional distress, attorney’s fees and costs.
(By Ric Hanson, KJAN, Atlantic)