7K Work Scheduling for Cops: How the System Steals from Our Nation's Police Officers

The Garcia Cycle:

It is called a "7K" work schedule by most emergency services administrators. Others refer to it as a "Garcia Cycle." Regardless of the name, it is the biggest financial ripoff that police and firefighters in the United States have ever seen, and it is completely legal.

As a retired law enforcement administrator, I am very familiar with the Fair Labor and Standards Act (FSLA) 7K work schedule and how it has permeated law enforcement agencies throughout our Nation. This article is not being written to explain the 7K system in detail (the legalese of this issue can be found here). Instead, this article will focus on what the police administrators don't tell their officers about the 7K system, and why every cop and firefighter in the United States should be fighting to get this discriminating law repealed from the United States Code.

What this really means to police and firefighters:

The simplest way to explain what the 7K system is doing to our officers is to illustrate its affects to you based on my most recent experience as a supervisor in a large campus police department within the State of Alabama.

This police department was working a standard 40 hour work week for many years until a new administrator (Police Chief) was appointed, and he immediately began shifting the department into a foundation that would support the 7K system. He had utilized the work schedule in his previous administrative career, and he knew exactly how to implement it within his new department.

When ready, the Chief held a meeting and explained to everyone in the department what a great work schedule the 7K system is. He told his staff that they will be off every-other weekend, and that their take-home pay will be increased. He promises rotating shifts and fairness to all, regardless of seniority. For most young officers, this all sounds wonderful, and the program is implemented with smiles and thankful pats on the back.

Once the 7K system was installed, officers soon began to understand the covert motivation behind the scheduling change, and they realize that it had nothing to do with making their lives better or providing them with more money. Instead, it was a complex act of budgetary-bullying that significantly lowered the value of the officer's work product (per salaried hour). Now, instead of making time-and-one-half pay for any work performed over forty hours (as is generally required by the FLSA), the department could work an officer eighty-six hours every two weeks and never pay a cent of overtime salary. In layman's terms, an officer working 86 (eighty-six) or more hours in a two-week period loses three hours of pay. Even at the rate of sixteen-dollars per hour, this is twelve-hundred and forty-eight dollars a year that is taken from the salary of a police officer. If you are not good at math, the total amount of this theft is over one-hundred dollars a month from every cop working the 7K schedule in the United States each year. This amount is even greater for those officers making in excess of sixteen-dollars an hour.

Fringe Benefits Lost due to the 7K Scheduling:

In addition to the loss of income, the officers are also victimized in other ways by the Garcia Work Schedule. At the campus police department that I was recently employed with, a fringe benefit to all campus employees was the right to take free college courses on campus. This is a very valuable fringe benefit, and in fact, it is the main reason that many officers sought employment at the University. But instead of educating themselves as they had planned, the newly implemented 7K system all but eliminated this benefit as a part of their compensation. With new off days that rotate weekly, police officers are never off the same day two weeks in a row. In addition, their shifts are a minimum of twelve hours long and often reach thirteen hours or more. With basically all university classes being scheduled on a Monday-Wednesday or Tuesday-Thursday schedule, it is impossible for the officers to attend classes at the school unless it is an Internet course (this university does not offer an Internet route to a degree and has few Internet courses). What is the cost of this prejudicial exclusion preventing the employees from utilizing their educational benefits? In monetary terms, it is thousands of dollars a year. In terms of hindering the officer's future career growth, the damage could add up to millions of dollars in missed opportunities.

In addition to the inequities described above, the 7K system also steals valuable vacation, holiday, and sick time from a police or fire employee. I'll bet that you never heard that from one of the articles in Police Chief Magazine. Right? But it is, in fact, a true statement. Consider that a regular employee earns a certain accumulation-rate of vacation, holiday, and sick time for each forty-hour work week they complete. Police officers earned this same rate of benefit accrual when they too were on a normal forty-hour schedule. But now, the officers must work 42 to 43 hours a week as a minimum in order to earn the same benefit accrual. This is a five to ten percent increase in the amount of work time required for the employee to accumulate what is given to others for a standard forty-hour week. As you can see, the 7K system has allowed state governments, municipalities, and even campus police departments to leverage themselves favorably in many aspects of police and fireman employee compensation. Why has no organization stood up to fight for the rights of our public servants?

Immoral Leverage from the FLSA 7K Law:

Finally, I have recently witnessed just how far immoral leadership can push the envelope while using the 7K law as justification. The campus police department that I described earlier went so far as to force officers to work overtime assignments on a regular basis. No, I am not talking about emergency situations. I am referring to basketball games, security post assignments, and other normal assigned-duty posts. This department charges a set rate for the services of its off-duty officers and maintains a monopoly on any extra work assignments that the officers can work. The department then pockets substantial profit based on the difference in the rate that they receive and the rate which they pay the rented-out officer. What makes this practice so immoral is the fact that many times the officer working the assignments will not even qualify for overtime pay based on the 7K rules. In fact, the department will make (I can't say earn) more profit by forcing a lower-payed officer to work the overtime assignment. That's right, they charge a set rate (roughly double the average salary), but they only pay the officer his normal salary rate. Sounds a lot like the oldest profession in the world, doesn't it?

One might wonder at this point, how can a state university, or any police department, allow their administrators to take advantage of their police and fire employees in this way? Even if it is legal, it is most certainly discriminatory (based on profession), and many would agree the practice is just plain dirty and an immoral business practice.

Unfortunately, many agencies, such as the Alabama university described above, take advantage of police officers because they can. The funds that they manage to manipulate from the working-class officers are often used as incentive rewards to increase the salaries of the administrators implementing the legal thievery. There seems to be no one willing to provide the muscle that will be required to fight back against this injustice. State-funded universities are often the economic engines driving a city or community, and few attorneys want to muddy their reputations and spoil future income possibilities by taking on such a giant. The local judicial system would also be very unlikely to support complaints, as political contributions and judicial appointments are often at stake when they make a decision affecting a state institution. With all of this working against the street cop, who would wonder why they are afraid to speak on this issue? Even police-protection agencies, such as the Fraternal Order of Police and the Police Benevolent Association will often back down from a full attack against these policies, as they know that defeating the discriminatory policies of the FLSA Ruling would be a near-impossible task to accomplish.

Attack on Law Enforcement and Firefighters a Trend?

It does appear that discriminatory wage practices (directed against first responders such as police and firefighters) is a growing financial strategy of government agencies within the United States. The only solution to this financial attack is for those affected (police and firefighters) to organize and fight back politically. For obvious reasons, there have been several prejudiced articles supporting the 7K work schedule that have been written by law-enforcement administrators. These administrators preach the advantages of the 7K scheduling system and rave that it helps them to meet their budgetary and manpower goals. This may certainly be true from their perspective, but these administrators have forgotten what it is like to actually 'work' for a living and have their wages unfairly targeted. Personally, I am insulted at the arrogance that would call this legal thuggery efficient leadership.

What You Can Do to Stop This:

Join your local Fraternal Order of Police, Police Benevolent Association, or other labor organization, and pressure your leaders to bring attention to these matters. Police and firefighters simply deserve to be compensated and protected in the same way that any other United States employee is compensated and protected. How can anyone legitimately argue otherwise? Would the American Public support any legislation that treats one goup of legal and free American Citizens differently from another group of legal and free American Citizens? The answer would seem to be no, but in reality police and firefighters know the answer to this question is now yes. The FLSA and United States Code was not designed to discriminate, bully, or unfairly subjugate our people. The laws were designed to protect.  Somehow, police and firefighters have to remind their Country of this concept.