Background
Current and former members of the Louisville Metro Police Department’s SWAT Team sued Louisville/Jefferson County Metro Government, seeking compensation under Kentucky wage-and-hour law and the applicable collective bargaining agreement for every hour they spent on call. SWAT officers generally were on call two weeks each month, could pursue secondary employment, could exchange on-call shifts without prior approval, and received vehicles in which to keep their tactical equipment. Department procedures preferred that officers answer calls within five minutes and arrive at callout locations within 45 minutes, and officers could not consume alcohol while on call.
Six officers, identified by the court as SWAT1, tried their claims to a jury, which returned verdicts for Metro. Fifty-three other officers, identified as SWAT2, had not yet tried their claims and pursued a protective appeal concerning rulings that could affect later trials. After initially granting SWAT1 a new trial, the circuit court reconsidered, reinstated the verdict, and denied renewed summary-judgment motions. The resulting consolidated proceeding comprised two appeals by the officer groups and two cross-appeals by Metro.
The Court’s Holding
The Court of Appeals affirmed every challenged ruling. It held that compensability turned on whether the on-call assignments primarily benefited Metro and were so restrictive that officers could not use the time effectively for their own purposes. The regulation’s separate “off duty” requirement—advance notice that an employee may leave and need not resume work until a definite time—did not control whether on-call time constituted work. The jury instructions correctly stated the governing on-call standard; including the off-duty language as an optional factor was error, but harmless and potentially favorable to SWAT1.
The court also upheld the circuit court’s evidentiary rulings concerning the total damages claimed by all officers, Metro’s finances, salaries and pensions, other departments’ pay practices, the complete collective bargaining agreement, and the officers’ choice to join SWAT. It found that an admonition adequately addressed a police chief’s comment about taxpayer money and that the report about other departments qualified for admission as a business record.
No party was entitled to summary judgment. The factual dispute over whether the restrictions prevented effective personal use of on-call time had been resolved against SWAT1 by the jury, while SWAT2’s individual claims remained untried. The court further held that Metro had not shown the collective bargaining agreement or governing statutes made the contractual grievance procedure the officers’ exclusive remedy. Metro’s directed-verdict issue was moot because Metro had already prevailed, although the court observed that SWAT1’s ability to hold secondary jobs and its limited evidence about callout frequency or discipline strongly undermined its compensation claim.
Key Takeaways
- On-call time is compensable only when the assignment primarily benefits the employer and the restrictions prevent employees from using the time effectively for personal purposes.
- The regulatory standards for “off duty” time and “on-call” time are distinct; an employer’s inability to specify when an on-call employee will next work does not itself make every on-call hour compensable.
- Metro did not establish that the collective bargaining agreement’s grievance procedure displaced the officers’ ability to pursue common-law contract claims in court.
Why It Matters
The published decision clarifies Kentucky’s test for compensating on-call employees and directs courts to focus on the practical severity of the restrictions rather than importing requirements from the regulation’s separate off-duty provision. That framework will govern any further proceedings involving the untried SWAT2 plaintiffs and may affect other Kentucky wage claims involving employees who remain reachable away from the workplace.