PORTLAND, Ore. — Hundreds of Portland Public School (PPS) custodians received an email from the district on April 12, saying the school district overpaid employees during the January ice storm, custodians said. Now, PPS is asking the employees to give some of the money back.
"They gave me three options to pay it back," said McKenna McVicker, a custodian at Scott Elementary School.
While schools were closed for a week, custodians went to work restoring schools so they could reopen.
"We had to come to work," McVicker said. "We had to come to work and check on the buildings, make sure there was no damages."
In their January paycheck, received in March, custodians received overtime and inclement weather pay, they said. Now the district is asking for some of the money back and claiming they overpaid custodians. Workers KGW spoke with said the district wanted anywhere from $90-$192 in reimbursement, though some workers were asked to return close to $500, SEIU union members said.
This comes after workers said their January paycheck was confusing.
"We had a paystub that was very vague," McVicker said. "It didn't give us anything, none of our hours, how we were getting paid."
Custodians said they asked the district for transparency on how their paycheck was calculated, though they never received clarification. They believe they were overpaid based on new contract requirements, which required inclement weather pay. The ice storm happened during bargaining when custodians were not working under a contract.
Months later, McVicker received an email on April 12, asking her to return $96. Another custodian received an email asking he reimburse the district $174.
"They're looking at me for $192," said Jim D’Arcy, a third custodian.
D'Arcy worked during the ice storm, removing snow and ice from his school. Now, he and other custodians said they need to readjust their budgets to make up for the district's error.
"That's really extremely hard for people who live paycheck to paycheck," McVicker said.
"We're all just pissed off, that, 'wow, we got to pay back for their mistake, for their error,'" D’Arcy added.
None of the custodians KGW spoke with have yet repaid the money.
In a statement, PPS said they regret the error and understand the overpayment inadvertently created stress on employees, though they are working to fairly resolve the issue. The district didn't answer KGW's questions of how much money was overpaid or how the mistake happened.
Meanwhile custodians said the recent email may change their behavior next time there’s a severe winter storm.
"What happens the next time there's a snowstorm?" D'Arcy said. "How many of us do you think are going to want to go into our buildings?"
Custodians are now asking Portland Public Schools to allow them to keep the money. They also want clarification on how the January checks were calculated and want the district to take steps to ensure this type of error doesn't happen again.