This School District had a school bus driver who filed a false disability claim and collected her full salary while not working. The District staff was tired of large increases in disability claims and started investigating whether the claimants were truly disabled. They took videos of the bus driver lifting heavy objects and jumping on and off a truck and fired her for filing an unjustified disability claim.
Kudos to the staff for starting the investigation. We don't have any facts on the situation regarding disability claims at Florida's Lake County School District, but this is a good example of District Management initiating their own investigation in Springfield, Ohio.
vj
From Springfield Ohio News Sun
http://www.springfieldnewssun.com/hp/content/oh/story/news/local/2007/08/13/sns081407collier.html
District justifies firing of former driver
By Lucas Sullivan
Staff Writer
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Springfield City Schools officials say they did not target former bus driver
Brenda Collier, as she has charged.
Instead, they fired her because Collier attempted to take advantage of the
district, which faced financial hardship in recent years, school officials
said. Prior to her firing, the district investigated Collier for fraud after
officials received a tip that she was performing duties that violated her
disability claim.
Her firing came as the district took steps to scale back its ever-ballooning
workers' compensation premium by going after employees who filed unjustified
claims, said Greer Young, director of safety and workers' compensation for the
district.
"We are trying to be good stewards," he said. "This was not a
witch hunt, nor were we targeting (Collier) for personal reasons. It is our
duty to monitor these things, and that's what we were doing. That's why we
hired an investigator."
Young said the district has taken great strides to reduce premiums paid to
the Bureau of Workers' Compensation that soared from $863,204 in 2003 to
$1,557,056 last year.
In 2005, there were 77 worker's compensation claims in the district. Those
claims resulted in the huge spike in the 2006 premium, Young said.
The claims dropped to 52 in 2006, and through the first eight months of this
year, there have been 24 claims.
This year, the district was asked to pay $1,168,196.
The number of claims have declined because of a reduction in personnel over
the past few years, but more so because of educating workers to be safer, Young
said.
"(The claims) are coming down, but it takes time (to have an effect on
the premium costs)," he said. "You just have to slowly pick away at
it."
Collier, 45, said she injured her lower back, neck and shoulders while
pulling on a large gate at the bus compound in November.
She was placed on disability and collected all of her salary after seeing a
doctor.
On March 20,
Collier was videotaped by a private investigator lifting boxes, furniture
and personal belongings, according to documents in her personnel file. Collier
said she was on a 10-pound weight restriction by doctors, and the heaviest item
she lifted weighed 11.5 pounds.
The videotape also showed Collier driving boxes and furniture to a storage
unit where she repeatedly jumped on and off the truck without difficulty,
according to the district.
"I am not taking advantage of the system," Collier said. "I
want to work."
