SDC Pays Out Another Round of Overdue Wages

The Social Development Commission has mailed out a second round of paychecks to employees who are owed wages for the pay period of April 15.

SDC received the rest of the $47,700 in emergency response plan funding from Unite WI on Sept. 17, according to SDC attorney William Sulton.

Sulton said he mailed employee checks to the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development, or DWD, on Sept. 18.

DWD received 22 checks for SDC employees for the April 15 payroll, according to a spokesperson from the department.

When SDC closed to the public and laid off its staff in late April, it could not make payroll, according to Sulton. Since then, the SDC Board of Commissioners has tried to gather funds to pay employees for owed wages.

“We are working to make sure that everybody gets paid as we get money,” Board Chair Barbara Toles said at a meeting on Sept. 25.

The board used some additional funding that SDC received after it suspended operations to cover the checks, Sulton said.

What’s next

Of the 22 checks, 10 are for individuals who filed complaints against SDC and the other 12 are for individuals who have not filed, according to DWD.

DWD will send the checks to respective employees once it confirms their addresses. Staff from the department’s Equal Rights Division have asked SDC for contact information for the employees who have not filed a complaint, according to a DWD spokesperson.

As of Sept. 26, 42 people have filed wage claims against SDC with the Labor Standards Bureau of DWD, with total wage claims standing at $168,759, according to DWD.

More wages owed

Sulton said that SDC still owes wages to at least four former employees for this payroll period, including former CEO George Hinton, who resigned at the request of the board, and Patrick Kirsenlohr, the former finance director who was fired in April.

The board is trying to confirm the rate of pay for one employee, Sulton added.

“SDC is just trying to pay as many people as it can, and the board believes that the most equitable way to do that is by paying the lowest-paid employees first,” Sulton said.

SDC also owes some employees for a second April payroll.

“The organization understands that it still owes them money for those payroll periods, so this isn’t a situation where SDC is trying to skirt that responsibility,” Sulton said.

Some employees also say they are owed missing March paychecks or payouts for unused paid-time-off, which the board is looking into, Sulton said.

DWD received checks in August from the SDC for six employees, bringing the total number of checks received up to 28.

Meredith Melland is the neighborhoods reporter for the Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service and a corps member of Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues and communities. Report for America plays no role in editorial decisions in the NNS newsroom.

SDC sends out second round of paychecks to former employees was originally published by the Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service.