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Subsequently, a "motion for distribution of notice and
release form" was filed by the Plaintiffs. The motion outlined
the independent trustee's determination of the method for the
allocation of the funds among the individual class members.
Pursuant to the guidelines in the joint stipulation of
settlement, the independent trustee considered factors such as
age, years of seniority, and the amount of severance pay
received. Some of the independent trustee's findings, as
pertaining to petitioner,4 are as follows:
Since some terminated employees received up to two
weeks severance and others received less, the first priority
will be to distribute the settlement funds to bring each
qualified claimant up to two weeks of severance pay for each
full year of seniority. Any remaining funds will be
distributed mainly to terminated employees who did not
transfer or receive ERIP [early retirement incentive
program] on the basis of the following point system:
[The point system allocated points based on: (1) Age,
increasing from age 25 to age 51 and decreasing from age 51
and up; and (2) years of service, increasing per year of
service.]
* * * * * * *
The rationale for basing this point system on seniority
and age is that workers who were near retirement age when
they were terminated were not damaged as much as younger
workers, (50, say) who probably will have more years of
lower-paying work or unemployment than a 58-year-old worker
who was closer to retirement. Similarly, young workers
4 Pursuant to the joint stipulation of settlement,
claimants were divided into different priority groups. The group
with the top priority included ex-employees who were terminated
without transfer of benefits under an early retirement incentive
program (ERIP). Petitioner was a member of this group inasmuch
as ERIP was not available to any of the Union members.
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Last modified: May 25, 2011