H. B. 2022


(By Delegate Ennis)

[Introduced February 14, 2001 ; referred to the

Committee on Education.]





A BILL to amend and reenact section eight-g, article four, chapter eighteen-a of the code of West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as amended, relating to allowing an employee who leaves employment voluntarily or through a reduction in force to recapture his or her previously earned seniority upon reemployment.

Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That section eight-g, article four, chapter eighteen-a of the code of West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as amended, be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
ARTICLE 4. SALARIES, WAGES AND OTHER BENEFITS.
 §18A-4-8g. Determination of seniority for service personnel.
(a) Seniority accumulation for a regular school service employee begins on the date the employee enters upon regular employment duties pursuant to a contract as provided in section five, article two of this chapter and continues until the employee's employment as a regular employee is severed with the county board. Seniority shall not cease to accumulate when an employee is absent without pay as authorized by the county board or the absence is due to illness or other reasons over which the employee has no control as authorized by the county board. Seniority accumulation for a substitute employee shall begin upon the date the employee enters upon the duties of a substitute as provided in section fifteen of this article, after executing with the board a contract of employment as provided in section five, article two of this chapter. The seniority of a substitute employee, once established, shall continue until the employee enters into the duties of a regular employment contract as provided in section five, article two of this chapter or employment as a substitute with the county board is severed. Seniority of a regular or substitute employee shall continue to accumulate except during the time when an employee is willfully absent from employment duties because of a concerted work stoppage or strike or is suspended without pay.
(b) For all purposes including the filling of vacancies and reduction in force, seniority shall be accumulated within particular classification categories of employment as those classification categories are referred to in section eight-e of this article: Provided, That when implementing a reduction in force, an employee with the least seniority within a particular classification category shall be properly released and placed on the preferred recall list. The particular classification title held by an employee within the classification category shall not be taken into consideration when implementing a reduction in force.
(c) On or before the first day of September and the fifteenth day of January of each school year, county boards shall post at each county school or working station the current seniority list or lists of each school service classification. Each list shall contain the name of each regularly employed school service personnel employed in each classification and the date that each employee began performing his or her assigned duties in each classification. Current seniority lists of substitute school service personnel shall be available to employees upon request at the county board office.
(d) The seniority of an employee who transfers out of a class title or classification category of employment and subsequently returns to that class title or classification category of employment shall be calculated as follows:
The county board shall establish the number of calendar days between the date the employee left the class title or category of employment in question and the date of return to the class title or classification category of employment. This number of days shall be added to the employee's initial seniority date to establish a new beginning seniority date within the class title or classification category. The employee shall then be considered as having held uninterrupted service within the class title or classification category from the newly established seniority date. The seniority of an employee who has had a break in the accumulation of seniority as a result of being willfully absent from employment duties because of a concerted work stoppage or strike shall be calculated in the same manner.
 (e) The seniority of an employee whose employment with the board of education is terminated either voluntarily or through a reduction-in-force and is subsequently reemployed with the same board of education in a regular full-time position shall be calculated as follows:
The county board of education shall establish the number of days between the date the employee left employment and the date of return to duty upon reemployment. This number of days shall be added to the employee's original seniority date established prior to the termination of employment. The employee shall then be considered as having held uninterrupted service from the newly established seniority date.
 (e) (f) A substitute school service employee shall acquire regular employment status and seniority if the employee receives a position pursuant to subsections (2) and (5), section fifteen of this article: Provided, That a substitute employee who accumulates regular employee seniority while holding a position acquired pursuant to said subsections shall simultaneously accumulate substitute seniority: Provided, however, That upon termination of a leave of absence or a suspension, the employee shall return to the status previously held. If the employee returns to substitute status, the employee shall retain any regular employee seniority accrued, however, this seniority may not be used in the bidding process for regular positions unless the employee again attains regular employee status or has attained preferred recall status. County boards shall not be prohibited from providing any benefits of regular employment for substitute employees, but the benefits shall not include regular employee status and seniority.
(f) (g) If two or more employees accumulate identical seniority, the priority shall be determined by a random selection system established by the employees and approved by the county board. A board shall conduct the random selection within thirty days upon the employees establishing an identical seniority date. All employees with an identical seniority date within the same class title or classification category shall participate in the random selection. As long as the affected employees hold identical seniority within the same classification category, the initial random selection conducted by the board shall be permanent for the duration of the employment within the same classification category of the employees by the board. This random selection priority applies to the filling of vacancies and to the reduction in force of school service personnel: Provided, That if another employee or employees subsequently acquire seniority identical to the employees involved in the original random selection, a second random selection shall be held within thirty days to determine the seniority ranking of the new employee or employees within the group. The priority between the employees who participated in the original random selection shall remain the same. The second random selection shall be performed by placing numbered pieces of paper equal to the number of employees with identical seniority in a container. The employees who were not involved in the original random selection shall draw a number from the container which will determine their seniority within the group as a whole. This process will be repeated if additional employees subsequently acquire identical seniority. The same process shall be utilized if additional employees are subsequently discovered to have the same seniority as the original group of employees but who did not participate in the original random selection through oversight or mistake.
(g) (h) Service personnel who are employed in a classification category of employment at the time when a vacancy is posted in the same classification category of employment shall be given first opportunity to fill the vacancy.
(h) (i) Seniority acquired as a substitute and as a regular employee shall be calculated separately and shall not be combined for any purpose. Seniority acquired within different classification categories shall be calculated separately: Provided, That when a school service employee makes application for a position outside of the classification category currently held, if the vacancy is not filled by an applicant within the classification category of the vacancy, the applicant shall combine all regular employment seniority acquired for the purposes of bidding on the position.
(i) (j) School service personnel who hold multiclassification titles shall accrue seniority in each classification category of employment which the employee holds and shall be considered an employee of each classification category contained within his or her multiclassification title. Multiclassified employees are subject to reduction in force in any category of employment contained within their multiclassification title based upon the seniority accumulated within that category of employment: Provided, That if a multiclassified employee is reduced in force in one classification category, the employee shall retain employment in any of the other classification categories that he or she holds within his or her multiclassification title. In that case, the county board shall delete the appropriate classification title or classification category from the contract of the multiclassified employee.
(j) (k) When applying to fill a vacancy outside the classification categories held by the multiclassified employee, seniority acquired simultaneously in different classification categories shall be calculated as if accrued in one classification category only.
(k) (l) The seniority conferred in this section applies retroactively to all affected school service personnel, but the rights incidental to the seniority shall commence as of the effective date of this section.

NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to allow school service personnel the same opportunity as professional school personnel to recapture previously earned seniority upon reemployment after their employment is terminated voluntarily or through a reduction in force.

Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken from the present law, and underscoring indicates new language that would be added.