Time is a commodity that will receive more scrutiny by LincolnCounty School District administrators when school resumes in thefall.

School board members and principals were informed Monday nightby the district’s attorney that they will need to institute a morecomprehensive employee timekeeping system to avoid potentiallawsuits and to comply more closely with labor laws.

“You have no choice but to comply,” said attorney Jim Keith.”You have to come up with a timekeeping system, and a sign-in andsign-out sheet will not be sufficient.”

Between 2002 and 2005, 110 school districts in the state weresued for not properly keeping up with the amount of time theiremployees worked and not adequately compensating them for theirovertime, Keith said.

The lawsuits prompted the State Auditor’s office to beginexamining districts for labor law compliance, he said.

“It’s not that they’ve done anything illegal,” he said. “Youwere not hit hard because you were not in the lawsuits. It’s alegal issue. Obviously, if we had our druthers we would prefer itremain unchanged.”

Superintendent Terry Brister said the district could not affordto wait for a lawsuit to institute a more comprehensive plan formanaging their employees’ time.

“The state auditors are looking for this now. We have nochoice,” he said.

There are several options open to administrators, Keith said,but perhaps the most economical would be a badge system similar tothat used by many corporations across the nation. Employees wouldswipe their badge when they arrive in the morning and again whenthey depart at the end of the day.

The complication comes with issues integral with the educationsystem. Teachers and some other employees are hired on contractswhile others are paid hourly. Also, the system cannot track howmuch time teachers spend working at home grading papers orconducting other school business.

However, Keith said, timekeeping systems are primarily designedto track hourly workers to ensure they are paid fairly for theamount of work they provide. Contract and salaried workers are paida set amount and, therefore, the system mainly tracks theirpresence at the job site – not the time spent on the job.

“One of the good things about this is that a good timekeepingpolicy makes sure everyone is treated fairly,” he said. “It helpsmanage overtime. Forty hours becomes 40 hours. And there is someflexibility in the system.”

Overtime hours would have to be cleared before they could beearned, Keith said, but approved overtime could be made up by theemployee leaving early during a day later in the week.

A major complication unique to school districts is the commonpractice of paying teachers over 12 months when they worknine-month schedules, he said.

Auditors will want assurances that workers are paid promptly forthe hours they worked. That means, he said, that to comply with thelaw districts cannot technically withhold payment to provideteachers with money during the summer.

“There are ways around that, but it requires creativity,” Keithsaid.

Some districts have absorbed the cost to maintain a second setof books and continued the traditional practice while others havecontracted with banks to provide a similar service.

Board members Monday only briefly discussed how they wouldaddress the “summer situation.” They agreed they needed moreinformation on the timekeeping software that would be used beforethey could begin to tackle the complications posed by the newsystem.

Another complication that will require further review is thework schedule of bus drivers, who often start and end their day farfrom the school and would not be able to physically log in and outof the system.

Some software, Keith said, allows employees to “clock” in andout remotely through their cellular telephones.

Districts involved in the lawsuits and some others have alreadymade the conversion, he said. Each district has its owncomplications to work through and no two systems have been exactlythe same. The board will need to determine what system works forthe district.

“It’s new. It’s different. There will be complaints,” he said.”But people will like it after a while. It just takes getting usedto.”

Kevin Garrett, business manager for the Lawrence County SchoolDistrict, also sat in on the meeting. Keith also represents theneighboring county.

“Hopefully, we can arrange a meeting for our people, too,”Garrett said. “We do not have an automated system, and it is quitea hassle to keep up with it manually.”