At the Employee Forum meeting on Wednesday, members heard a presentation from Linc Butler, associate vice chancellor for human resources, on changes to payroll and employee status.
Butler said legislation changes related to the Fair Labor Standards Act could impact how employees qualify for pay. He said currently, employees are sorted into non-exempt and exempt workers, with exempt workers earning a salary. Non-exempt workers are paid hourly.
Butler said the changes could impact the minimum amount for an employee to qualify as an exempt worker, meaning some current employees could shift to an hourly pay.
Butler said these changes would have the most impact on timing of payroll, hours worked and loss of status for some.
“I hesitate to try to get inside the minds of our legislators," Butler said.
The Employee Forum meeting also included a presentation from Natiaya Neal, an Employee Forum delegate from the Gillings School of Global Public Health, about staff awards and from UNC’s Ombuds director Wayne Blair.
Neal said staff is nominated for the awards which include the “call of duty” and “customer service” awards.
Blair reviewed data his office collected over the past year on how many cases they had, what kinds of cases and who brought the cases. Ombuds is a campus resource that helps members of the Carolina community with any problems they may have, including office conflicts. Blair said their office also looks at trends and reports on them, such as the trend of increasing time to find solutions to such problems.
"If there is a word I want to share with everyone today, it is one word and it is anxiety," Blair said.
