Yesterday, I discovered that in this retirement house where I live the board/management are violating the law.

They offer a noon meal five days a week, closed on weekends. In order to keep from having to pay health insurance for their kitchen/dining room staff, three years ago they cut everyone to either 20 hours for support staff and 29 hours for the cook.

However, it is impossible for the daily work to be done within those hours.

Staff comes in at 7:00 AM, spends the next 4 hours cooking, preparing and boxing about 150 meals for the Meals on Wheels program which is sent out five days a week.

At 11:00 they start working on the daily inhouse meal. They begin serving at 11:45 and stop serving at 12:15. On paper, they are supposed to serve until 12:30 but they are required to lock up and go home by 1 o'clock, and if they serve beyond 12:15 there is no way finish cleaning up by then.

From 7 o'clock to 1 o'clock they take a break at whatever time they can, but it is difficult to get one and sometimes they can't.

Now. From 7:00 to 1:00, it is 6 hours. Even if they were able to take off ONE hour - which they never do - they still would be working FIVE hours.

They get paid for FOUR.

This is run by a non-profit Catholic Community services board. There is no way that the board doesn't realize that they are breaking the law.

The Department of Labor regulates this kind of thing. Should they be notified to investigate?

Staff says they want no trouble, that they are glad to have a job. But what they are being required to do is ILLEGAL.