Foster v. City of New York, New York

Background

The plaintiffs in both actions are current and former City employees who alleged violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), the federal law governing minimum wages and overtime. They claimed that the City did not pay overtime for work performed before and after scheduled shifts or during unpaid meal periods. The Foster plaintiffs included Child Protective Specialists and supervisors. The De La Cruz plaintiffs included Job Opportunity Specialists and Associate Job Opportunity Specialists working in divisions of the City’s Human Resources Administration.

The plaintiffs used the City’s CityTime timekeeping system and were subject to policies requiring overtime to be pre-approved, overtime hours to be approved in CityTime, and weekly timesheets to be certified. An earlier summary-judgment ruling had determined that some plaintiffs performed unpaid overtime work of which supervisors were aware. That ruling also found, among other things, that the City violated the FLSA concerning certain pre-shift, meal-period, and post-shift work, the calculation of overtime rates, and compensatory time paid at a straight-time rate. The earlier ruling did not decide whether the plaintiffs could pursue their claims collectively.

Report and Recommendation

The plaintiffs moved for a finding that the employees in each action were similarly situated under 29 U.S.C. § 216(b). That provision allows employees with similar FLSA claims to join together in a collective action if they provide written consent. Magistrate Judge Lehrburger recommended finding that the Foster plaintiffs were similarly situated to one another and that the De La Cruz plaintiffs were similarly situated to one another.

The recommendation relied on common factual and legal issues. The plaintiffs in each case were subject to the same CityTime and overtime policies, including mandatory use of CityTime, overtime pre-approval, automatic meal deductions, and alleged failures to pay for known, non-pre-approved work before shifts, during meal periods, and after shifts. Their common legal issue was whether the City had to pay for overtime it knew about even when the work had not been approved in advance.

The City’s Objections

The City argued that the plaintiffs’ different job duties, assignments, locations, and potential defenses made collective treatment inappropriate. It also argued that the court should create subgroups within each case. For Foster, the City proposed separate groups for Child Protective Specialists, Child Protective Specialist Supervisors Level One, and Child Protective Specialist Supervisors Level Two. For De La Cruz, it proposed groups based on three work assignments. The plaintiffs offered different subgroup proposals for possible use at trial.

Court’s Analysis

Judge Gardephe reviewed the recommendation de novo because the City objected to it. Applying the Second Circuit’s approach, the court explained that plaintiffs are similarly situated when they share a legal or factual issue material to resolving their FLSA claims. Differences in other respects do not defeat collective treatment when the plaintiffs share material similarities.

The court held that the CityTime system and the City’s timekeeping and compensation policies were material to all of the plaintiffs’ claims. It emphasized that all plaintiffs were required to use CityTime, were subject to the same rules about clocking in and out and overtime approval, and had evidence of unpaid overtime known to supervisors. The plaintiffs also shared the legal issue of whether the City had to pay for known overtime regardless of whether it had been pre-approved. The court concluded that this evidence met the relatively low standard for showing that plaintiffs were similarly situated.

The court rejected the City’s arguments that differences in job titles, duties, assignments, or locations required separate treatment. It also concluded that the cited decisions did not require separating these plaintiffs into subgroups merely because they held different positions or performed different functions. The court noted that the parties had not adequately briefed the reasons for their competing subgroup proposals and that the issue would benefit from further discussion and negotiation.

Disposition

The court adopted Magistrate Judge Lehrburger’s Report and Recommendation in its entirety, overruled the City’s objections, and granted the plaintiffs’ motions for a finding that the plaintiffs in each case were similarly situated. The clerk was directed to terminate the motions. The court did not decide at that time what subgroups, if any, would be used at trial, and directed the parties to submit a joint letter proposing a schedule for completing expert discovery.