The following is a statement issued today by State Senators Tim Ashe, Cheryl Hooker, Jane Kitchel, Chris Pearson, and Michael Sirotkin on Walmart preventing their employees from receiving Essential Worker Hazard Pay grants. The employer must apply. The state disburses the funds to the employer, who then would pay the employees through their regular payroll system.
“We are extremely disturbed to learn that Walmart has indicated they will not allow their Vermont employees to receive essential worker hazard pay grants. Their decision, cruel under any circumstances, is especially unthinkable since the grants are intended to thank essential workers who stayed on the job in high risk positions in the earliest days of the COVID pandemic.
“During the first difficult months of COVID, while most Americans were at home, many of these essential Vermont workers were asked to keep working or had no choice but to do so. Their work put them at heightened risk of exposure despite all the precautions that were taken. Some of them had to stay away from their spouses and partners and kids. Some were mistreated by customers. And some got sick.
“While our society has a long way to go to right the historically unfair compensation of many essential workers, we are proud that Vermont created a hazard pay program to recognize our essential workers with a modest but meaningful financial grant for their efforts during the first three months of COVID. This makes us just one of three states in the country that has done so, having been the first to put a proposal forward and the most generous in what we are providing.
“Our hazard pay grant program will benefit nearly 30,000 people throughout Vermont. Sometimes saying ‘thanks’ is not enough. This is one of those times.
“For a worker to receive a hazard pay grant, his or her employer needs to apply for it. This decision was made for administrative simplicity – better several hundred employers verify eligibility than requiring the submission of 30,000 applications.
“While we believe most employers of eligible employees are indeed applying on behalf of their workforce, we are extremely concerned that Walmart has indicated they will not.
“This means that many hundreds, if not more than a thousand, Walmart employees at their six Vermont locations will not receive either the $1200 or $2000 grants to which they are entitled.
“Let us be crystal clear – this is not a grant to Walmart; it is a grant for essential workers. Walmart merely fills out the form and passes on the grant awards to their employees.
“Adding insult to injury, since eligible retail employees must earn less than $25/hour to qualify for a grant, Walmart’s decision solely disadvantages its lowest paid employees. And since eligible workers must have been on the job from mid-March to mid-May, these employees can only be considered very loyal to Walmart. Walmart’s nonparticipation in the essential worker hazard pay grant program is the coldest of shoulders to these most loyal of employees.
“We strongly urge Walmart to reverse course and allow their employees to receive hazard pay grants. It is the right and decent thing to do.”
Source: November 5, 2020 Senator Ashe, Senate President Pro Tem.