Csea

Introduction

When a classified school district employee is on disability leave for five months or less, the employer school district may not, under Education Code section 45196, deduct from the absent employee’s salary an amount exceeding the sum “actually paid a substitute employee employed to fill his position during his absence.” (Ed. Code, § 45196.) (All further statutory references are to the Education Code unless noted.) As an alternative, the school district may maintain a policy of crediting regular classified employees with additional working days per year of paid sick leave. (§ 45196.)

Joan Featherstone is a classified employee of the Tustin Unified School District (School District). While she was on temporary disability leave, the School District, pursuant to its long-standing practice, assigned some of her work hours to other classified employees and deducted their pay from her salary. The California School Employees Association and its Tustin Chapter No. 450 (together, the CSEA) challenged that practice on the ground those employees were not substitute employees because they were already employed by the School District and, hence, were not employed to…