A Tuesday memo from the Kenai Peninsula Borough issuing restrictions on the use of Paid Time Off for Borough employees has generated a stir within the Borough. Talk about the memo was a hot topic during the Borough Assembly meeting on Tuesday evening, with Mayor Charlie Pierce promising clarification later in the week. On Thursday, Mayor Pierce and members of the Borough’s administrative team appeared on KSRM to offer that aforementioned clarification.
Kim Saner, the Borough’s Human Resources director, told Borough employees that requests for Paid Time Off with the purpose of traveling out-of-state would not be authorized.
The memo, as originally written on Tuesday, November 10, states that “no Borough employees will be permitted Personal Time Off to travel out-of-state unless it is for a validated emergency. Any scheduled travel must be cancelled effective immediately.” It goes on to add: “At this time, there is no prohibition for PTO to travel in-state, however, we ask that you travel smart and safe.”
Saner told KSRM that the purpose of the memo is not to dictate what people do on their personal time, but rather, to prevent repercussions to Borough operations when workers return: “The purpose behind this is to look at what the net effects are across a span of time. When you stay inside a state, there are no restrictions for you coming back to work; you don’t have to be tested, you simply show up back to work the next day. When you do out-of-state travel, based upon our state mandates, there are restrictions. Those restrictions have changed across time.”
He added: “Even though, right now, the mandates say there are options: you can either test beforehand and have that test presented at the airport, and you can come back to work, in practice, that’s not what’s taking place. In practice, when you get to the airport, they’re saying, ‘This three day test is not going to be sufficient – you have to take five days at home, then test, present the test back.’ That’s time that the Borough did not anticipate you being away from your place of employment.”
Mayor Pierce further clarified that PTO will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, but that Saner is not wrong in the formation of the new PTO policy: “Before COVID, we would have never questioned, nor would we have ever put any restraints on people traveling. Today, when you travel, you take two weeks off, you might wind up with a month off. What we’re saying is that we might not be able to do without you for a month. There’s important functional positions that have to be staffed.”
Ultimately, the Mayor conceded that if he found out an employee utilized PTO to take a trip to Disney Land, that person would still be employed, but may be a little worse-for-wear financially: that employee finding themselves not being paid for the time off. A clarification was made that Borough employees can utilize unpaid time for their quarantine period, to find a solution in cases where out-of-state trips are a necessity.