Dartmouth custodian Malerie Duff was looking forward to her most recent payday even more than usual.
In late May, the college announced that many of its employees would receive a one-time “special payment” of $1,000 to “recognize the effort and dedication” they’ve shown during the tough times of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The 33-year-old Duff didn’t think she’d have any trouble qualifying for the bonus money, which was limited to employees who make $150,000 or less annually. This year, she figures to earn under $40,000.
But when Duff looked at the pay stub from her automatic bank deposit on June 25, she was in for a surprise. “I got nothing,” she told me.
How come?
When Duff started at Dartmouth last November, working the third shift from 10 p.m. to 6:30 a.m., she was hired as a so-called “temp.”
On the college’s website — two-thirds of the way down the page outlining the special payments — it says that temporary employees aren’t eligible for the bonus.
Never mind that last winter Duff was part of the cleaning crew at Dick’s House, the college’s infirmary, where students who aren’t feeling well often end up.
In Duff’s case, working on the college’s front lines during a global pandemic wasn’t special enough.
But Dartmouth administrators pulling down six figures while attending Zoom meetings in the comfort of their homes month after month?
They got their thousand bucks.
The use of temps is a frequent bone of contention between the college and Local 560 of the Service Employees’ International Union (SEIU, for short) that represents about 430 blue-collar Dartmouth workers.
In June, Dartmouth had 141 temporary hourly employees, college spokeswoman Diana Lawrence told me in an email. Not all of the positions, however, are considered union jobs.
Using temps to fill vacancies for union and nonunion jobs is a way many employers get around paying people higher wages and providing benefits, such as health insurance.
Dartmouth is no different. “The college tries to save wherever it can,” said Local 560 President Chris Peck, a painter who has worked at the college for more than 30 years.
In April, Local 560 leaders successfully argued that after five months on the job, Duff deserved to become a permanent employee with benefits. Her hourly pay jumped from $15 to $19 — a weekly increase of $160 or so.
Duff thought that getting moved off temp status would also qualify her for the $1,000 special payment. “I was going to pay my rent with it,” said Duff, a 2006 Lebanon High School graduate who recently moved to a new apartment in Sunapee.
She called the college’s payroll department to see if there’d been a mix-up.
“I’m at a loss,” she told me. “I don’t know if there’s anything more I can do.”
Probably not. “The special payment was designed to recognize permanent employees,” Lawrence wrote in our email exchange. The money came from “unrestricted funds and expense savings” during the last fiscal year, she added.
Along with putting me in touch with Duff, Local 560 leaders also told me about Kris Allen, who works in the college’s carpentry shop.
When we talked, the 44-year-old Allen said he didn’t want to sound critical of the college because he’s happy with the job that he’s had for nearly three years.
Still, Allen admitted that he was “disappointed” when he looked at his most recent pay stub. Instead of getting the full $1,000 special payment, he received $670, before taxes.
Early on in the pandemic, Allen built plexiglass shields for dining halls and installed hand sanitizer stations around campus.
In September, when their three children, ages 11, 8 and 5, went back to school in South Royalton, Allen and his wife, who works as an educator in another town, found themselves in a pinch.
Due to the pandemic, they lost their child care provider, who dropped off the kids at school in the morning and picked them up in the afternoon.
Allen told union leaders about his predicament. “I probably could have sat at home (collecting unemployment benefits), but I wanted to work,” he said.
The union and Dartmouth management worked it out so Allen could start his shift at 9 a.m., 1½ hours later than usual, and leave a couple of hours earlier than scheduled.
“The college was very receptive,” Peck said, referring to Allen’s schedule change that allowed him to drop off and pick up his children from school.
Dartmouth’s union carpenters earn $28 to $30 an hour, which meant Allen took a big cut in pay by going from 40 hours to 25 hours a week, Peck said.
In other words, Allen really could have used the full special payment. Allen went back to working 40 hours a week in mid-June, but the college still pro-rated his special payment.
“It seems unfair that he’s being penalized for taking care of his kids during the pandemic,” Peck said.
Approximately 560 Dartmouth employees received pro-rated payments, Lawrence said.
With roughly 3,000 employees eligible under the rules it set up, Dartmouth spent a few million bucks on the one-time payments.
It’s a thoughtful — and morale-boosting — move at a time when a lot of people are struggling. But how much would it have taken for Dartmouth to extend its largesse just a bit further?
To snub some workers completely and shortchange others undermines Dartmouth’s goodwill gesture. But I guess even at an institution of higher learning with a $6 billion endowment, generosity only goes so far.
Jim Kenyon can be reached at jkenyon@vnews.com.
