Policy

Region Ten Community Services Board staff will conduct themselves in such a manner that their level of professionalism and commitment to those served is evident and brings credit to consumers, the Board, or themselves. Whereas the Board employs a variety of individuals, some of whom do not belong to professional organizations that have an identified Code of Ethics, the following policies are established to guide and appraise conduct, primarily in relationships with consumers. These procedures are not intended to deny the application of existing Codes of Ethics for certain disciplines, for example, nurses, physicians, psychologists, social workers, or professional counselors.

When situations covered by this code occur, employees should contact their Division Director. Employees should discuss with their supervisors any situations not specifically covered by this code.

Ultimately, each employee is responsible for her/his own behavior.

Guidelines:

1. Employees will not practice or condone any form of discrimination on the basis of race, color, gender, sexual orientation, age, ethnicity, religion, or mental or physical disability.

2. Employees will not engage in any activity that is physically, emotionally, or verbally abusing to consumers, her/his family member or guardian.

3. Employees will be aware of and avoid personal and professional circumstances that may cause a conflict of interest and hinder making judgments in the best interests of a consumer, her/his family member(s) or guardians(s).

4. Employees will not exploit relationships for personal or professional gain by:

5. Employees who have service-providing relationship with consumer(s) will not engage in romantic or sexual associations with those consumers, their family members or guardians.

6. Employees will forego any activity that might violate the legal and /or civil rights of the consumers, their family members or guardians.

7. Employees will not conduct, condone, or participate in unauthorized experimentation or research.

8. Employees will respect the privacy of the person being served and hold in confidence all information, whether verbal, written or electronic, obtained in the course of professional service. Upon termination, the employee will maintain client and coworker confidentiality.

9. Employees will uphold the standards of any board or accrediting organization under which they are licensed.

10. Employees will present accurately their education, training and experience and only provide services for which they have both the abilities and qualifications.

11. Employees will refrain from retribution against consumers or colleagues for reports made in good faith of alleged unethical, unprofessional or illegal activity.

12. Employees will abide by safety standards and procedures and seek to minimize workplace injury.

13. Employees will abide by the performance standards established in their job description.

14. Employees will manage all Region Ten financial, legal, and record keeping matters with accuracy and integrity.

15. Employees who have the responsibility for employing and evaluating staff performance, will do so in a responsible, fair, considerate and equitable manner and will follow current standards of policy and practice at Region Ten.

16. Employees will observe the codes of conduct established in the policies found in the Region Ten Human Resource Policy Manual and the Client Policy Manual including, but not limited to:

Leave

Policy:

Leaves of absence are provided by the Board in the interest of the health and well being of its employees. It is the responsibility of the employee to assure that enough leave has accrued prior to his/her taking it and to assure that leave over the allowed limits is not accumulated.

It is the responsibility of each employee and his/her team leader to contact the Accounting/Payroll office and track the accumulation of leave.

Guidelines:

1. Annual Leave - Salaried employees are entitled to paid vacation in accordance with the schedule below (prorated for part-time):

* Credits over the maximum accumulation are lost.
* Annual leave is a benefit for the employee, it should be scheduled so that it does not unduly hinder or disrupt the ongoing work effort. All annual leave must be requested and approved in advance by the team leader.
* In the case of termination or extended leave without pay, all accumulated annual leave will be paid. In the event of death, the employee’s estate will be entitled to payment of unused annual leave.

2. Compensatory Leave - Compensatory leave may be arranged on an hour-for-hour basis. Compensatory leave should be requested and approved for in advance by the team leader. No more than forty hours may be accumulated and carried at any time (pro-rated for part-time).
· Compensatory time is not usually made available for attending conferences, classes, meetings, etc. outside of work hours. Compensatory time for such activities, when a requirement for agency business, may be granted at the discretion of the team leader.
· Accumulated compensatory time is not payable upon termination.

3. Civil Leave - Employees are granted a leave of absence with pay for any absence necessary for serving on a jury, attending court as a witness under subpoena, or taking a test of fitness for military service. The employee must show the order requiring such duty when the leave is requested. Civil leave is not credited against either sick or annual leave.

4. Absence for Death in Immediate Family - Leave allowance with pay is granted for the death of an immediate family member. Full-time employees receive 24 hours; part-time employees receive their total percent time multiplied by 24 hours, e.g., someone who works 65% time would receive .65 x 24 = 15.6hours. Additional time may be granted by the supervisor.
· The immediate family is defined as spouse/partner, parent, child, sibling, grandparent, parent-in-law, foster parent, or a blood relative who has served as a foster parent.
· Absence for death in the immediate family is not credited against either sick or annual leave.

5. Military Leave - Region Ten enthusiastically supports its employees’ service in the armed forces of the United States. Therefore, in accordance with federal law, Region Ten will provide re-employment and benefit protection to any employees absent from work due to service in the uniformed services (which includes active duty, reserve duty, duty in the National Guard, and any other category designated by the President in time of national emergency or war).
a. Notice. Employees must, where possible, provide Region Ten with advance notice of military service.
b. Rights. While on military leave, the employee is generally entitled to the same rights and benefits that Region Ten generally provides to employees having similar seniority, status, and pay who are out on non-military leave.
1. Health Benefits. Region Ten will provide continuous coverage for the group health insurance for up to 18 months of the military leave. For the first 31 days of military leave, the employee will be responsible for 102 percent of the entire premium. Upon return from military leave, neither the employee nor covered family members will have a waiting period for coverage.
2. Seniority. Employees who return to Region Ten following military leave will be credited with all seniority that otherwise would have accrued but for the military leave. Thus, all benefits accruing by virtue of seniority will be credited to the employee upon his or her return from military leave.
3. Re-employment Rights. Generally speaking, Region Ten will promptly re-employ an employee returning from military leave in the job that the employee would have had if the employee had remained continuously employed. With some exceptions required by federal law, however, this right to re-employment ceases after five years of military leave.

To exercise his or her re-employment rights, the employee returning from 30 days or less of military leave must report to Region Ten by the beginning of the first regularly-scheduled workday that occurs eight hours after the employee returns home. An employee returning from 31-180 days of military leave must report no later than 14 days after completion of his or her service. An employee returning from service of 181 days or more must report within 90 days of completion of his or her service. Exceptions to these requirements will be made for employees recovering from service-related injury or illness.
c. Reserve or National Guard: Permanent employees who are members of the Reserve or National Guard are entitled to a maximum of fifteen calendar days of paid leave annually for active duty training.
· This does not apply to weekly or monthly drills.
· Military leave is not credited against either sick or annual leave.
6. Sick Leave - Probationary and permanent full time employees earn sick leave at the rate of 8 hours for each completed month of service. Part-time employees earn sick leave in relation to the number of hours worked per month.
· Sick leave is not provided for less than 15 days of employment.
· Sick leave may be used for personal illness, exposure to a contagious disease,
to keep a doctor’s or dentist’s appointment, or for illness of an immediate family
member as defined above.
· The supervisor may request verification of any illness that results in the use of sick leave.
· In the cases of serious illness, staff members may request accrued annual leave and compensatory leave if their term of illness exhausts their accrued sick leave. If the extended illness exhausts their accrued sick leave, annual and compensatory leave, staff members will receive no further pay (an exception to this is outlined in the Extraordinary Sick Leave plan). In this case, the staff member’s hospitalization and life insurance will lapse unless he/she pays the full premiums (usual deducted amounts) for both, on or before the 15th of each month to the Human Resources Office. The Human Resources Office will inform staff of probable coverage lapses well in advance of occurrence.
· Sick leave benefits will accumulate year to year, but unused sick leave days are not payable in full on termination of employment except for resignations due to childbirth. At termination, an employee who has reached his/her 5th anniversary while an active employee will be paid up to 1/4 of accumulated sick leave hours or $5000 maximum, whichever is less. (This is the state policy and is subject to change as that policy changes.)

7. Extraordinary Sick Leave - In the case of severe prolonged illnesses, after the accrued sick, annual and compensatory leaves have been exhausted, an employee may be granted an additional one-half day sick leave for every month of his/her employment with the Board.
· A doctor’s note regarding the illness and expected length of absence will be requested.
· In computing this benefit, the time of employment cannot be used more than once. A request for activation of this special plan must be made in writing to the team leader.
· The division director in consultation with the management team has the authority to grant or deny activation of this plan.

8. Emergency Leave – In the even of a major emergency, an employee may request Emergency Leave. An example of such an emergency is losing one’s house to fire. Emergency Leave is not granted for normal medical emergencies. A request for Emergency Leave should be made in writing to the Division Director and must be approved by the Division Director.

Standard:
Effective: November, 1988
Revised: November 9, 2004

Sick Bank

Policy:
Region Ten will maintain a sick leave bank, to be used when a member of the bank becomes incapacitated by long-term illness or injury, as long as one-third of the eligible members agree to participate in accordance with the terms contained herein.

Membership in the sick leave bank shall be voluntary and open to all eligible personel who accrue sick leave. Each employee who accumulates sick leave is eligible for membership and may become a member by donating one day of sick leave upon joining and one day thereafter whenever an assessment is required.

Guidelines:

1. An eligible employee may enroll within the first thirty days of employment. An employee who does not enroll when first eligible may do so during the open enrollment period, between any subsequent September 1 to October 15 period, by making application to the Human Resources Office. Enrollment the first year the bank is in existence will be for any eligible employee who fills out the appropriate form and submits this form to the Human Resources Office within the initial enrollment period. Membership in the bank may be earned by contributing one day of sick leave upon joining and one day thereafter whenever an assessment is required. The donated days of leave will be deducted from the donor’s accumulated days of sick leave.

2. Requests for leave time from the bank must be made in writing by the employee (or his representative if the employee is unable to submit the request) in advance of the absence for which the extra days are to be granted. Requests cannot be made retroactively.

3. The first twenty (20) consecutive working days of illness, or disability will not be covered by the bank, but must be covered by the member’s own accumulated leave or leave without pay. This requirement may be met in cases in which twenty days of absence, although not consecutive for the same illness/injury, occur within thirty working days.

4. Requests for use of the sick leave bank must be made in writing by the employee (or representative if the employee is unable to submit the request) prior to the absence for which the leave days are to be used.

5. A maximum of forty-five (45) working days each year can be drawn by any one member.

6. Days drawn from the bank for any one period of eligibility must be consecutive, except additional periods of disability resulting from recurrence or release of the original illness which will be covered fully on a continuing basis up to the annual maximum of forty-five days. Otherwise, members must return to work and must meet the requirements of #2 before becoming eligible to utilize sick leave bank benefits again
7. A member of the bank will not be able to use sick leave bank benefits until the employee’s sick leave time declines to zero.

8. Members of the bank will be assessed additional days of sick leave, at such time as the bank is depleted to 1/3 the number of staff times 8, unless they choose not to participate further in the bank. Members who have no sick leave to contribute at the time of assessment will be assessed one day and allowed to temporarily maintain a negative balance.

9. Members utilizing sick leave days from the bank will not have to replace these days except as a regular contributing member of the bank.

10. Upon termination of employment or membership in the sick leave bank, a participating employee may not withdraw the days he has contributed to the bank.

11. Requests must be supported by a medical doctor’s certificate.

12. The Human Resources Officer is designated as the administrator of the sick leave bank.