For a while Heath Omar had an employer that was very flexible about Omar's work as a volunteer with Hiawatha Fire Rescue in Iowa. According to an article by Adam Belz of The Gazette, Clipper Windpower agreed when Omar was hired in August 2007 to allow the firefighter to leave his full-time job to respond to emergency calls.
Belz cites an Iowa Unemployment Insurance Appeals decision that indicates Clipper modified the arrangement last September when Omar missed a shift due to illness but failed to make proper notifications.
Still, the firm apparently agreed to let Omar arrive late if he was out on a call at the start of his shift. From Belz's article:
Also, Omar's superiors knew he could not call to report his absence while he was driving an emergency vehicle.
On Nov. 3, Omar responded to an emergency call in the morning and "reported his tardiness as soon as he could," Scheetz wrote. He arrived to work an hour late, worked a full day and was fired at the end of his shift.
Clipper later laid off some 90 employees in January, many of them at the company's Cedar Rapids plant.
The administrative law judge handling the case ruled in Firefighter Omar's favor.
There was no comment from any of the parties except Chief Mike Nesslage, Hiawatha Fire Rescue. Chief Nesslage told the reporter, "I see a decline in employers and others in general in their patience for volunteer firefighters. I think in an urban area it's worse. They don't think about it. They just assume those services are there and they don't really think about where they come from."
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