BAY AREA, CA — KQED has agreed to pay nearly $1 million to settle a class-action lawsuit accusing the San Francisco-based nonprofit news organization of failing to pay hourly employees for all their work, including overtime, according to KQED.
The lawsuit alleges that KQED failed to provide off-duty meal breaks or rest periods, furnish accurate wage statements, and produce employment records upon request.
The news organization denied the claims but agreed to pay about $895,000 to settle the case to "protect the station, our members and the community we serve from a protracted and more expensive legal battle," company spokesperson Peter Cavagnaro said Thursday, according to KQED.
Dominic Dulaney filed the lawsuit on behalf of other hourly KQED employees in January 2024. Dulaney, an Antioch resident, worked as an hourly, nonexempt KQED employee from approximately May 2018 through November 2022 but did not belong to the station's newsroom, according to the news organization.
According to the lawsuit filed in January 2024, KQED failed to maintain accurate time and meal-period records, issued incomplete wage statements, failed to reimburse necessary job expenses, and withheld some wages after employees left the organization.
The complaint alleges that KQED required employees to work during unpaid meal periods and after clocking out, then failed to pay them minimum, straight-time, and overtime wages for those hours.
It also claims KQED denied employees legally required meal and rest breaks, failed to pay the additional wages owed for missed breaks, and sometimes pressured workers to waive second meal periods when they worked at least 10 hours.
The lawsuit also alleges that KQED failed to provide Dulaney's personnel, payroll, wage, and timekeeping records within the deadlines established by California law.
The complaint sought civil penalties, interest, attorneys' fees, legal costs, and a court order requiring KQED to comply with California labor laws. The allegations remain claims and do not establish that KQED committed the violations claimed by Delaney.
San Francisco Superior Court Judge Ethan Schulman granted preliminary approval of the settlement May 4.
The proposed settlement would distribute slightly less than two-thirds of the approximately $895,000 payment among more than 580 hourly employees who worked at KQED between August 2019 and May 2025.
KQED would also pay $37,500 in penalties to the state Labor and Workforce Development Agency and another $12,500 in penalties to hourly employees who worked at the organization between November 2022 and May 2025.
Some KQED employees began receiving notices of their proposed payouts earlier this week, KQED reported, and the court scheduled a final approval hearing for Nov. 4.
Individual payments would depend on the number of hours each employee worked during the covered periods, KQED reported. Employees may opt out of the settlement, while Dulaney could receive up to $10,000 as the class representative.
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