Posts tagged lower-income

    Research ● Labor Unionization Unions

    Education and Workforce Committee Passes 3 Bills to Expand Flexibility, Boost Earnings, and Hasten Back Pay

    November 25, 2025 // On Thursday, the House Education and Workforce Committee passed three bills to boost flexibility, wages, and efficiency for workers. These three bills would modernize the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act to provide flexibility for workers, simplicity for tipped employees, and more efficient resolutions to payroll errors. Importantly, none of these provisions will cost taxpayers a single dime because they simply remove unnecessary barriers to flexibility and higher pay. In fact, at least one of the bills would likely save taxpayers from unnecessary administrative costs.

    back pay base wages Biden administration Biden rule comp time DOL Ensuring Workers Get Paid Act Fair Labor Standards Act flexibility House Education and Workforce Committee HR 2299 HR 2312 HR 2870 lower-income Minimum wage overtime pay paid leave PAID program payroll errors Payroll Independent Audit Determination presidential administrations private-sector workers Public Sector Workers self-audits Tipped Employee Protection Act tipped employees tips wages Working Families Flexibility Act

    Press Release ● Corruption Unions

    Former Scranton Police Officer And Police Union President Sentenced To Imprisonment For Federal Program Fraud In Connection With Overtime Patrol Shifts At Scranton Area Housing Complexes

    June 7, 2024 // The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania announced today that Paul Helring, age 48, a former Scranton police officer and the former elected police union president, was sentenced on June 4, 2024, by United States District Court Judge Robert D. Mariani to 6 months’ imprisonment and a 2-year term of supervised release for the offense of Theft Concerning Programs Receiving Federal Funds. According to the United States Attorney’s Office, from approximately March 2021 to May 2022, while serving as the coordinator of Scranton Police Department’s extra duty overtime program, Helring knowingly obtained by fraud over $5,000.00 in compensation that was paid to him for certain extra duty patrol shifts at local, Scranton-area, lower-income housing complexes that Helring claimed to work but did not in fact work. In all, the investigation found a total of 526 hours that Helring claimed to work patrolling the complexes but that he did not actually work. At his sentencing, Helring was ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $17,831.40 and to pay a fine of $5000.00. He was also ordered to complete 100 hours of community service as a condition of his supervised release.

    FBI fraud housing complexes lower-income overtime Paul Helring Pennsylvania police officer Public Corruption Task Force restitution Scranton Scranton Police Department theft