At the city of Chico, California, last week, the city council voted 6 to 0 to settle two workers’ compensation claims. One was with Jason Gibbs, a field supervisor in operations and maintenance for $107,537. The other was with police officer Todd Boothe for $62,350.
The settlements were made in a closed session. No other details were made available.
The settlements will be paid by the city’s Worker’ Compensation Fund. Safety employees injured in the course and scope of their employment are, according to the California Labor Code, entitled to disability leave without loss of salary for a period of up to one year. They receive full pay and benefits and suffer no loss in leave accrual or seniority.
A universal observation in workers’ compensation claims was made vociferously by the city of Chico in April 2015 that the longer employees are away from their workplace, the harder it is to get them back to meaningful employment and to maintain their morale. Now Chico is attempting to return previously injured employees to work in some capacity including modified duties.
In July 2015, Chico’s policy changed to charge salary and benefits for employees out on workers’ comp to their respective departments, and not to the Workers’ Compensation Fund. Overtime for employees who cover shifts for workers’ out on workers’ comp leave was changed to be paid out of the Workers’ Compensation Fund, instead of the departmental budgets, as are all medical costs, legal costs, and other non-payroll related expenses.
It’s not known if Todd Boothe’s workers’ compensation claim is connected to personal and professional harm he alleged after “defamatory statements” he accused councilor Randall Stone of making in November of 2013. In an Internet post, Boothe had called Stone “incompetent”. Stone then after searching Boothe’s Facebook page had made accusations of racism and homophobia. This prompted a departmental investigation.
Barbara Martin, the Chico budget and treasury manager, said to the local newspaper, the Chico Enterprise Record, “(The previous system) lessens the need for them (the departments) to get their workers back working because they are not being harmed at all by not having that person on their department’s payroll. Now with the way we are doing it, that person is still being charged to their department, so they are not gaining anything by having that person out.”
The current and long-term costs with the workers’ compensation program are funded by charges to city salaries, paid by the city. Barbara Martin continued in her statement to the Chico Enterprise Record, “It’s just another fund where we need to have the reserves to be able to pay those claims. We don’t want it to be another fund that goes in the negative and we have to cover it by other means.”
Prior to a rate reduction in 2010-2011, the cash in the Workers’ Compensation Fund of the city of Chico totaled $6.3 million. By June 30, 2014, the balance had decreased to $2.5 million.
lonce@adjustercom.com, Lonce LaMon, journalist; copyright Lonce LaMon and adjustercom; all rights reserved
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