JOS/AJOS I OVERTIME (FLSA) LAWSUIT UPDATE
SSEU Local 371 is very pleased to announce that the overtime lawsuit filed on May 6, 2024, on behalf of 1,343 JOS and AJOS I employed by the Human Resources Administration – Francesca Anderson, et al v. City of New York – has now reached a tentative settlement! This case involves the following claims under the federal overtime law, the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).
• Uncompensated Pre-Shift, Post-Shift and Meal Period Work in excess of 40 hours per week
• Regular Rate and Straight Time Overtime Claims based on whether the City paid the proper overtime rate of one and half-times a worker’s regular rate of pay (including differentials) for all hours worked over 40 in a workweek
• Delayed Payment Claim due to the City’s failure to timely make overtime payments
The Anderson case involves the same claims that were successfully litigated in the prior cases on behalf of JOS & AJOS I Workers after 8 1/2 years of hard-fought litigation – Feiner v. City of New York and De La Cruz v. City of New York.
With the assistance of the Settlement Team (Francesca Anderson, Sabrina Morell, and Sabretha Ervin-Turner), Plaintiffs’ Counsel – Spivak Lipton LLP and McGillivary Steele Elkin LLP – just reached a settlement with the City of New York in the amount of $4,216,673 million.
The settlement is tentative in the sense that all plaintiffs will be individually notified of the settlement terms by a letter sent by the law firms in the next two weeks. Plaintiffs should wait to receive their letter before calling the law firms with any questions as the letters will explain in great detail the settlement terms and how the settlement money is being allocated. After all plaintiffs are notified of the settlement, the settlement then needs to be approved by the Court and the City will have 90 days from the date of Court approval to pay the settlement money. We will publicize once the Court has approved the settlement and there is a due date for payment of the settlement money (which likely won’t be until early 2026).
Individual settlement amounts will vary based on length of active employment during the recovery period (i.e., excluding any leaves of absence), the date the plaintiff joined the case by submitting a consent form and whether a plaintiff received a settlement award in the Feiner and/or De La Cruz case. Note that the law only allows plaintiffs to recover damages for a maximum of three years prior to the date that a plaintiff’s consent form was filed in Court regardless of their overall length of employment, with the earliest recovery in this case beginning on May 6, 2021. This will all be explained in each individual plaintiff’s settlement letter.
PLEASE NOTE THAT YOU ARE ONLY A PLAINTIFF IN THIS CASE IF YOU SIGNED A CONSENT FORM AND RECEIVED A LETTER FROM THE LAW FIRMS, CONFIRMING THAT YOU ARE A PLAINTIFF.
If you are a plaintiff in the case, and if you have any questions after you receive your settlement letter (by September 15th), you should directly contact the law firms handling the case:
Spivak Lipton LLP: 212.765.2100 ext. 26 or via email at nlandig@spivaklipton.com
McGillivary Steele Elkin: 202.833.8855 or via email at info@mselaborlaw.com
