In December 2011, I sent this email to a retired Lansing firefighter I'd been in contact with:

I have a question you might be able to answer. In the 2010 wage information for City employees on my website (steveharrypublicpolicy.com), the total wage is given along with its components: wages, overtime, miscellaneous and final leave payment. The hourly rate is also given, and I have been trying to calculate annual salary by multiplying the hourly rate by 2080, the number of work hours in a year assuming a 40 hour work week. For most employees, including police, the calculated annual salary is very close to the wages figure in the first column. However, that is not the case for firefighters. What I'm finding is that actual "wages" runs about $20,000 more than salary calculated from hourly rate. Why is this? It is not overtime, because overtime is listed separately. Do firefighters work more than 40 hours a week? And if they do, wouldn't the pay for those extra hours be reported as overtime?

Here is an example of what I was talking about:

$21.77 times 2080 = 45,281.60, but Jacob Atwood's regular wages for 2010 were $63,256.90. And $16.38 times 2080 = $34,070.40, but Clyde Davis' regular wages for 2010 were $48,356.40.

Here is the retired firefighter's reply:

All professional firefighters are paid based on a 54 hour work week per FLSA nationwide. (FLSA is the Fair Labor Standards Act.) All departments can have different working schedules, but if they go over 54 hours, there must be some kind of arrangement. In the case of LFD [Lansing Fire Department], this arrangement comes in the form of a day off every 77 work days, called an Extra Leave Day. This XLD day brings their average back to 54 hours so that the COL [City of Lansing] does not have to pay anything extra.

It all has to do with when an employer is required to pay overtime. This is from Section 207, Maximum Hours, of the Fair Labor Standards Act:

(k) Employment by public agency engaged in fire protection or law enforcement activities

No public agency shall be deemed to have violated subsection (a) of this section with respect to the employment of any employee in fire protection activities or any employee in law enforcement activities (including security personnel in correctional institutions) if—

(1) in a work period of 28 consecutive days the employee receives for tours of duty which in the aggregate exceed the lesser of

(A) 216 hours, or

(B) the average number of hours (as determined by the Secretary pursuant to section 6(c)(3) of the Fair Labor Standards Amendments of 1974) in tours of duty of employees engaged in such activities in work periods of 28 consecutive days in calendar year 1975; or

(2) in the case of such an employee to whom a work period of at least 7 but less than 28 days applies, in his work period the employee receives for tours of duty which in the aggregate exceed a number of hours which bears the same ratio to the number of consecutive days in his work period as 216 hours (or if lower, the number of hours referred to in clause (B) of paragraph (1)) bears to 28 days,

compensation at a rate not less than one and one-half times the regular rate at which he is employed.

Note that 216 hours divided by 28 days is 54, which the work week length given me by the retired firefighter.

But this is from Article 12, Work Week, of the IAFF contract with the City of Lansing (page 16):

Effective January 1, 1995, the average workweek for the Fire Fighting Division will be fifty three and eight hundred forty-five thousandths (53.845) hours. Scheduling will reflect the 53.845-hour average workweek. The schedule shall provide one additional 24-hour day off during each 78-day cycle. Any change in the existing 2-platoon system shall be negotiated to the mutual agreement of both parties to this Agreement. The parties agree that employees shall no longer be eligible for overtime under Act 604 (MCLA 408.384a) under the above schedule.

The difference between 54 and 53.845 is less than 2 tenths of an hour, but we will go with 53.845 - it's in the contract. 53.845 times 52 weeks is 2799.94 hours per year. Let's see how that works with our example:

$21.77 times 2799.94 = $60,954.69, still over $2000 less than Jacob Atwood's regular wages for 2010. And $16.38 times 2799.94 = $45,863.02, still over $2000 less than Clyde Davis' regular wages for 2010.

The figures still don't quite work out, but until I have better information, I will calculate annual salary for members of the Fire Fighting Division by multiplying hourly rate by 2799.94 (53.845 hours per week times 52 weeks per year). If you can clarify this issue for me, please email me at stevenrharry@gmail.com.