Opinion ID: 2206061
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Did the State Adopt a 207(k) Workweek?

Text: Normally, an employer must pay overtime to an employee for work in excess of forty hours per week. 29 U.S.C. § 207(a). However, a special overtime provision for law enforcement employees exists if a public employer adopts a work period consisting of at least seven days and up to twenty-eight days, the employer is not required to pay overtime compensation on a forty-hour work week. 29 U.S.C. § 207(k). The regulations define a work period as any established and regularly recurring period of work which, under the terms of the Act and legislative history, cannot be less than seven consecutive days or more than twenty-eight consecutive days. 29 C.F.R. § 553.224. A 207(k) work period need not coincide with the duty cycle or pay period or with a particular day of the week or hour of the day. Id. Overtime compensation is not due until such time as the employee has worked more than 171 hours during the twenty-eight-day work period if an employer adopts a twenty-eight-day work period. 29 C.F.R. § 553.230(b). The burden to prove the existence of the section 207(k) work period is with the State. Barefield v. Vill. of Winnetka, 81 F.3d 704, 710 (7th Cir.1996). An employer may establish a work period by a public declaration. Spradling v. City of Tulsa, 95 F.3d 1492, 1505 (10th Cir.1996). However, as long as the employer can demonstrate it factually established a 207(k) work period, a public declaration is not necessary, even if it did not have a 207(k) work period in mind when it adopted its scheduling. Barefield, 81 F.3d at 710. The stipulation filed by the parties confirms the officers subordinate to the peace officers are scheduled based on a twenty-eight-day, 171-hour work period for purposes of the FLSA. The time sheets of the peace officers show the peace officers kept track of work time in the same manner as their subordinate officers. This method of recordkeeping supports these peace officers had a twenty-eight-day, 171-hour work period under the FLSA. Substantial evidence supports the conclusion the State factually established a 207(k) work period, without a public declaration, even if it did not have a 207(k) work period in mind when it adopted its scheduling.