A Fate Worse Than Death?
No major news in today's annual report from State Auditor Elaine Howle on investigations her office has conducted as part of California's Whistleblower Protection Act.
Rather, a piece of advice for state workers: if you miss work due to the death of a loved one, you might have to produce the body.
The report chronicles the case of an employee for the Department of Industrial Relations, who told her bosses that she needed to be away from work for two days after the death of her aunt.
Well, not really. Howle's report says it best.
"However, public records show that the employee was incarcerated in a Los Angeles County jail for those two days. By charging bereavement leave for hours she missed due to her incarceration, the employee improperly claimed and received $282 for 16 hours she did not work, a violation of state law."
It reminds me of an infamous line delivered by George Costanza from an old Seinfeld episode, when he was caught in a different workplace no-no:
"Should I have not done that? I tell you, I've got to to plead ignorance on this thing, because if anyone had said anything to me at all when I first started here that that sort of thing was frowned upon..."
