'It's a forced vacation:' new inclement weather policy means some employees go without pay

Suspended operations on campus Monday required state employees of the University to take unpaid leave and make up the hours when they can, according to the new inclement weather policy.

The policy, instituted on Jan. 1 of this year, says all non-mandatory employees — those deemed nonessential to University operations — are forbidden from coming to work in Condition 2 circumstances. Instead, they must work from home, use compensatory time or take leave without pay when Condition 2 is declared.

Employees can make up lost hours but have to do so within 90 days during a work week shorter than 40 hours. They are prohibited from working overtime to make up the hours, according to the official policy.

Charles Streeter, chairperson of the Employee Forum of UNC, said he’s heard mixed reviews.

“There are folks who were not liking the fact that you’re being told that you must leave, not that you have the option to leave, but that you must leave work,” Streeter said.

“It’s a forced vacation.”

Felicia Washington, vice chancellor for workforce strategy, equity and engagement, said the policy is not entirely new but rather a combination of two state policies — the adverse weather and emergency closing policies.

Washington said the new policy lays out different definitions of weather conditions than those used by UNC in the past.

“The attempt was to take out the element of employees having to decide whether or not it was safe enough to come,” she said.

Linc Butler, associate vice chancellor for human resources, said the consolidation is an attempt at statewide regulation.

“There has been a recent move on behalf of the Office of State Human Resources to attempt to get away from each individual state agency and each individual university having their own version of a policy,” he said.

Another concern employees have with the new policy is making up lost time, Streeter said.

“There have been several folks who have sent in complaints, and we have presented those to Human Resources,” he said.

Streeter said since the policy was handed down to the UNC-system General Administration from the Office of State Human Resources, it does not have much flexibility.

But the University’s human resources department is working to help employees affected by the policy, including encouraging managers to allow employees to work from home and warning employees about adverse weather ahead of time.

“We are going to continue to do our very best to be mindful of adverse weather events and communicate conditions to our community as early as possible,” Washington said.

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