Federal Firefighter Flexibility and Fairness Act

II 117TH CONGRESS 1ST SESSION S. 838 To amend section 5542 of title 5, United States Code, to provide that any hours worked by Federal firefighters under a qualified trade-of- time arrangement shall be excluded for purposes of determinations relat- ing to overtime pay. IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES MARCH 18, 2021 Mr. VAN HOLLEN (for himself, Mr. TESTER, Ms. COLLINS, and Mr. CARPER) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs A BILL To amend section 5542 of title 5, United States Code, to provide that any hours worked by Federal firefighters under a qualified trade-of-time arrangement shall be ex- cluded for purposes of determinations relating to over- time pay. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa- 1 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Federal Firefighter 4 Flexibility and Fairness Act’’. 5 VerDate Sep 11 2014 23:30 Apr 03, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00001 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S838.IS S838 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS 2 •S 838 IS SEC. 2. TREATMENT OF HOURS WORKED UNDER A QUALI- 1 FIED TRADE-OF-TIME ARRANGEMENT. 2 Section 5542 of title 5, United States Code, is 3 amended by adding at the end the following: 4 ‘‘(h)(1) Notwithstanding any other provision of this 5 section, any hours worked by a firefighter under a quali- 6 fied trade-of-time arrangement shall be disregarded for 7 purposes of any determination relating to eligibility for, 8 or the amount of, any overtime pay under this section. 9 ‘‘(2) For purposes of this subsection— 10 ‘‘(A) the term ‘qualified trade-of-time arrange- 11 ment’ means an arrangement under which 2 fire- 12 fighters who are employed by the same agency 13 agree, solely at their option and with the approval 14 of their employing agency, to substitute for one an- 15 other during scheduled work hours in the perform- 16 ance of work in the same capacity; and 17 ‘‘(B) the term ‘firefighter’ means a firefighter 18 as defined by section 8331(21) or 8401(14).’’. 19 Æ VerDate Sep 11 2014 23:30 Apr 03, 2021 Jkt 019200 PO 00000 Frm 00002 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6301 E:\BILLS\S838.IS S838 pbinns on DSKJLVW7X2PROD with BILLS