VALDOSTA — A Lowndes County group aiding people with disabilities is dealing with a labor department ruling that it owes more than $150,000 in wages to about 130 employees.

The Lowndes Advocacy Resource Center on East Park Avenue has been told by the U.S. Department of Labor to pay $157,473 to 130 employees “for failing to meet the requirements of Section 14(c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act,” according to a statement from the labor department issued Thursday.

The problem, LARC executives said Friday, comes down to a definition of what constitutes “break time.”

LARC provides various services to the county’s developmentally disabled people, including a “sheltered workshop” program where people with disabilities can earn a paycheck by performing carefully supervised jobs, such as building cardboard boxes to ship trim parts for a jacuzzi manufacturer.

Workers have been given 15-minute unpaid breaks on a regular basis, executives said.

“None of our clients works for very long periods without a break,” said Harry Hamm, LARC executive director.

After an investigation by the labor department’s wage and hour division, LARC was effectively told that 15 minutes wasn’t good enough.

“In the eyes of the Department of Labor, there’s no such thing as a 15-minute break,” said Nearing Adams, director of business operations for LARC.

LARC is certified by the labor department to pay a sub-minimum wage in its “sheltered workshop” program; however, the organization has been told to pay the time for those 15-minute breaks at full minimum wage, Hamm said. From now on, all breaks will be 30 minutes, he said.

The situation with back pay will not affect LARC’s ability to be re-certified for sub-minimum wages, said Steve Jaramillo, assistant director and corporate compliance officer for LARC.

The organization is not in danger of going under, but the financial hit will have consequences, Hamm said.

“We are able to pay for this out of reserve funds,” he said, “but we will have to cut the budget in a couple of places.”

In the “sheltered workshop” program, almost half of the participants have been let go.

“We’ve gone from 105 down to 60,” Adams said.

“Forty to 45 people who got a paycheck no longer get a paycheck,” he said. “That is the saddest outcome … that number of developmentally disabled people losing jobs is devastating.”

Those who were let go can still take part in LARC’s other programs, such as arts and crafts, community visits, music lessons and classes in life skills, Adams said.

Another point the labor department mentioned was the way LARC rounded off decimals in calculating wages.

“We were always told that you rounded down for numbers under 6,” Hamm said. “The labor department rounds everything up.”

LARC’s finances are handled through Quickbooks software, Adams said.

“The rounding problem was in thousandths of a penny. … You would have to work 1,000 hours to gain an extra cent,” he said.

The labor department also criticized LARC for failing to provide documentation on referral resources for “self-determination, peer mentoring and self-advocacy.” Hamm and Adams said this was a new requirement mentioned in only one sentence of 1,600 pages of regulations.

“We called other agencies around Georgia, and none of them had heard of this document,” Hamm said.

LARC has now created this document, giving websites to organizations that can help people with disabilities to live and work in the community.

Hamm said the entire investigation began because a disgruntled former employee contacted the labor department. Hamm described the ex-employee as someone who disagreed with the entire “sheltered workshop” principle. That employee’s specific allegations were disproven, he said.

Terry Richards is senior reporter at The Valdosta Daily Times.