Sec.5-241-2. Layoff

(a) "Employee" means an employee holding a position in the classified service of the state, whether full time or part time, for which compensation is paid, who has been appointed to that position following successful completion of a working test period.

(b) An appointing authority may lay off an employee for lack of work, economy, insufficient appropriation, change in departmental organization, abolition of position, or any cause other than disability, delinquency, incompetence, misconduct or neglect of duty. No employee shall be laid off if any other employee in the same job classification performing comparable duties with less state service is to be retained in the same department, agency or institution. For the purposes of this section, the employee security division may, at the discretion of the labor commissioner, be excluded from the remainder of the labor department and deemed to be a separate agency.

(c) 1. In the absence of an applicable collectively bargained lay off procedure, the appointing authority shall, prior to deciding to lay off an employee, provide the employee with oral or written notice of the possible action, the reasons for it and a specific time and place for a meeting where the employee will be given an opportunity to present any information he deems pertinent. The meeting will be held by the appointing authority or the appointing authority's designee.

2. If written notice is given it may be mailed, return receipt requested, or hand delivered to the employee at work. If the notice is mailed, the time of the meeting when the employee will be given an opportunity to present his information shall be no sooner than five working days following the mailing of the notice. If the notice is hand delivered to the employee at work or given orally, the time of the meeting when the employee will be given an opportunity to present his information may be any time following receipt of the notice, including a time immediately following receipt of the notice.

3. The purpose of such a meeting is to determine if there are alternatives to lay off or whether the wrong employee has been selected for lay off.

4. If the employee declines or fails to attend the meeting, the appointing authority may proceed with the decision to lay off as deemed appropriate.

5. Within a week of a decision to lay off an employee, the appointing authority shall provide written notice stating the reason for the decision. The effective date of the lay off shall be no earlier than two weeks from the date of such notice.

6. A copy of such notice of lay off shall immediately be forwarded to the Commissioner of Administrative Services.