The Health District is a subrecipient of the County’s share of the Coronavirus Local Fiscal Recovery (“CLFR”) grant funding (Exhibit A). In order to pay out the funds to qualifying employees, the District must create a premium pay policy (Exhibit B). The policy must comply with 1) Article 2, Section 25 of the Washington State Constitution, 2) the American Rescue Plan Act, 3) the U.S. Treasury CLFR Interim Final Rule (31 CFR Part 35) and U.S. Treasury FAQs, and 4) collective bargaining law.
As stated in the attached policy, throughout the entirety of the COVID-19 emergency, citizens of Snohomish County have been relying on the work of District employees who face the risk of exposure to COVID-19 to maintain government services. Many District employees cannot choose to work from home and must come to work to perform their jobs, which can involve substantial interaction with customers and co-workers that could potentially spread the virus.
Employees are eligible if they have been employed at the District as of the effective date of the policy in a full-time or part-time position budgeted for at least 20 hours per week. They were assigned their regular duties for at least six months between March 23, 2020, and the effective date of the policy. And during those six months were required by their supervisor to perform job duties on-site for a cumulative total of at least one hundred twenty (120) hours that placed the employee in a position of potential exposure to COVID-19.
Once the policy is approved, supervisors will need to complete a justification form (Exhibit C) for the classification of employees and then the individual employees will be listed on a qualifying spreadsheet (Exhibit D). For those qualified employees, funds will be paid out in the hours worked from October 16 through December 15, 2021.