Mineola, NY- Nassau County Comptroller George Maragos released his audit of Eager to Serve, Inc., a homeless shelter provider for Nassau County. The findings included under paying employees $4,899, not paying employees bi-weekly as required by New York State Labor Laws (sometimes delaying payments for months), employee time sheets not matching hours worked, and not providing complete original payroll records to the Comptroller's Office. In one case an employee had to wait almost two years (658 days) to get paid. The audit period covered 2012-2014.
“The audit findings are not only very disturbing but may also underscore more extensive issues with the quality of housing provided to our neediest residents,” Comptroller Maragos said. “We intend to open a more extensive audit of the Homeless Shelter Industry on the quality of shelter being provided with taxpayer money.”
The audit found hourly rates paid to employees were less than the rates mandated by the Living Wage Law for 11 employees from 2012 through 2014 for a total of $4,899. The vendor also did not pay overtime in accordance with the Fair Labor Standards Act which is the rate of one and one half the regular rate of pay for hours worked in excess of 40 hours per week. For the period 2012-2014, overtime in the amount of $217 is due to two employees.
Employees were not paid on a timely basis, as required by New York State Labor Law. There was a significant lapse in the processing time that occurred from the date worked on the employee’s timesheet to the date the employee received pay (check was cut). The number of days ranged from 27 to 658 days from the last date of the work period to the pay date (check date). Discrepancies were also found between the number of hours worked by employees as listed on paystubs and the hours shown on timesheets. This may have resulted in employees not being paid for the proper number of hours worked.
For Years 2012-2014 combined, the County made payments totaling $650,604 to the vendor. Exhibit I below shows all fees paid in Years 2012 to 2014.
Exhibit I
The Nassau County Living Wage Law was enacted by the Nassau County Legislature in 2006 to raise the minimum wage of County employees and employees working for most of the County’s contractors. The Comptroller’s Office is responsible for monitoring compliance with the Law. The Living Wage is currently $15.50 an hour without health benefits, or $13.58 with health benefits.
The full report is available on our website.
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http://www.nassaucountyny.gov/agencies/Comptroller/index.html