A. 
A full-time employee may be granted a leave of absence without pay by the department head with approval of the Town Manager for a period not to exceed one year. The employee must use all vacation and holiday entitlement earned before commencing his/her leave of absence. The employee is expected to use this leave time only for the purpose for which it has been granted, and failure to return to work on the expiration of a granted leave shall be deemed a resignation from service. Possible uses of leaves of absence shall include, but not be limited to, attendance at an educational institution, service in a labor union or medical disability.
B. 
No employee shall receive a salary or Town-paid fringe benefits while on leave of absence. However, the employee may elect to continue to be covered under the Town's insurance program, provided that the employee pays 100% of the cost of his/her continued participation. Employment and leave of absence shall terminate when the employee accepts other employment. When computing length of service for any reason, time spent on a leave of absence will not be computed. In effect, this changes the anniversary date of the employee for salary increases and other benefits.
[Amended 3-9-2021]
Military leave and rights to re-employment after such leave are available to employees under the terms and conditions of applicable federal and state law and USERRA and may be amended as needed to comply.
A. 
Military leave with pay: Employees (including employees who hold acting capacity and project appointments) are allowed up to two regular scheduled weeks in a rolling twelve-month period without loss of pay or benefits when engaged in any form of military duty. The employee must provide advance written or verbal notice as far in advance as is reasonable under the circumstances and must furnish the department head with an official statement signed by authority giving the employee's rank, pay, and allowance during the employee's military service. The employer will pay a minimum of the difference, if any, between the employee's regular pay and military leave pay up to the two weeks The employer reserves the right to pay the full 40 hours base wage for the first two weeks and the employee may be responsible to turn in all or part of their paid military wages upon their return to work up to gross wages paid.
B. 
Military leave without pay: When military service exceeds the two weeks authorized for military leave with pay, the employee must be placed on unpaid military leave. Employees may use, but are not required to use, accrued PTO, sick, vacation, etc., when entering unpaid military service to offset their benefit payroll deductions. The total wages paid from accrued leave and military pay should not exceed 100% of their gross base wage weekly. Provisions for the optional use of accrued sick, PTO, vacation, etc., also apply to employees who are called to active state duty by the Governor.
C. 
Re-employment:
(1) 
The guiding principle of the USERRA and Maine law is that an employee performing military service is not to suffer any detriment in employment and should be treated as if they had not left employment. Employees who enter military service retain reemployment rights under both the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act of 1994 and Maine law. Exceptions are narrowly restricted to persons who hold temporary, nonrecurrent employment. Although certain criteria are required for an employee to exercise their reemployment rights, denial of reemployment to a returning service member should be considered an extraordinary situation. Human resource professionals should be consulted if any adverse action is contemplated.
(2) 
An employee who enters military service on a short-term basis would generally be returned to the position that they left. Employees who enter military service on a long-term basis would be returned to the position that they left or be returned to a position of like status and pay for which they are qualified. Human Resources should be consulted if denial of reemployment for any reason is contemplated.
(3) 
Upon the completion of service (less than 31 days, including weekend drills) employees are also entitled to reasonable time for return travel, and an eight-hour period of rest, before returning to work. The allotted time to apply for reemployment increases incrementally, depending upon the length of service. Human Resources should be consulted in unusual situations.
A. 
An employee may be excused from work up to five days because of the death of his/her spouse. He/she may be excused from work up to three days because of death in his/her immediate family as defined below. The employee shall be paid his/her regular rate of pay for the scheduled work hours missed. It is intended that this time off be used for the purpose of handling necessary arrangements and attendance at the funeral.
B. 
"Immediate family" is defined to mean parents, children, brothers, sisters, mother-in-law, father-in-law, brother-in-law, sister-in-law, grandparents, grandchildren, stepparent or other relative living in the same household with the employee.
C. 
One workday may be granted to employees at the sole discretion of the Town Manager for attendance at funerals of persons not covered under the above definition.
The Town shall pay an employee called for jury duty the difference between his/her regular pay and his/her juror's pay upon presentation of an official statement of jury pay received. Employees excused from jury duty must report back to work during their normal shift hours.