When the University announced its furlough dates, workers making less than $23,660 annually were told they would not be affected.

But, that is not the case.

Employees taking furlough days are prohibited from coming to work on those days. Those who make less than $23,660 – who were told they would not be affected by the furlough – have been notified the University will effectively be closed, and they must either take a leave day or work extra hours to make up for those lost.

But hourly workers who are unable to make up the eight hours missed on Friday have little choice other than taking the leave day.

Ron Hamlin, director of Campus Transit, said his employees were given three options.

“One is to work four 10-hour days during the week of the furlough [to constitute a 40-hour work week]. One is to take leave. And one is to take overtime … [where employees] work 5.3 hours overtime [being paid time and a half] and it’ll be credited as eight hours toward their furlough day,” Hamlin said, noting there were three employees within Campus Transit who were faced with this decision.

“The three all opted to work and bank their time as compensatory time,” he said Wednesday.

The options workers were given varied by department, as supervisors had the discretion to determine the options. But Matthew Winston, assistant to the president, said department supervisors were told they should exhaust all options before resorting to having employees who are exempt from furloughs take the day off.

“If all options were explored and they didn’t work out … [then] the supervisor would be able to request permission [to have workers take leave] and have that approved by a senior vice president, basically completely shutting down their unit and not being able to provide or have the opportunity for employees to work,” Winston said Wednesday.

Winston said it did not surprise him that some employees were being asked to take leave days, but he said the number of workers in such a situation should be “few and far between.”

“Every supervisor was supposed to find a reason not to do that,” he said.

Holley Schramski, associate vice president for the University’s Human Resources department, said there are multiple ways departments could address the issue of how to compensate workers who are not being furloughed, but cannot work on the furlough day.

“Changing work schedules is an option,” she said Wednesday, “but compensatory time works too. [That's] just one way to tackle it – there’s many different options.”

Schramski said every department struggled with addressing ways to make the furlough day work – by either scheduling work hours or providing compensatory time to match the needs of the particular department. She said Human Resources gave each department the latitude to determine which options best fit its specific needs.

“For someone who is not subject to the furlough, we want those people to be paid and not be negatively impacted,” Schramski said.

What is unclear is whether or not a worker is paid for the day if he or she opts to take leave instead of work compensatory hours.

Schramski said workers who take the leave option are paid for their day off, but Winston said workers would not be paid.

“If an employee does not work, then they can’t be paid,” Winston said. “We couldn’t do that. It’s a violation of federal and state law.”

The issue is the type of leave the employee is allowed to take. Schramski and Board of Regents spokesman John Millsaps both said if a worker can take “annual leave,” then he or she will be paid for that day.

These types of workers would be those who are benefits-eligible, Schramski said. For benefits-eligible workers, a paid leave day is similar to taking a paid vacation day.

Schramski said workers who are subject to the furlough cannot take a paid vacation day, since the purpose of the furlough is to cut costs. But those who are not subject to the furlough, and are considered benefits-eligible, can take a paid leave day.

“The main point is [for] the people under the $23,660, it does not affect their pay, so therefore it’s really within the purview of the University of Georgia to figure out how to make all of that work,” Millsaps said.

But, whether paid or not, employees below the $23,660 annual salary mark who were told would not be affected by the furloughs will be taking a day off with the rest of the University on Friday.

“I hate that it happened that way,” Winston said. “I hate that we’re doing furloughs in the first place.”