Chicca v. St. Luke's Episcopal Health System

858 F. Supp. 2d 777, 2012 WL 844899
CourtDistrict Court, S.D. Texas
DecidedMarch 12, 2012
DocketCivil Action No. H-10-2990
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 858 F. Supp. 2d 777 (Chicca v. St. Luke's Episcopal Health System) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, S.D. Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Chicca v. St. Luke's Episcopal Health System, 858 F. Supp. 2d 777, 2012 WL 844899 (S.D. Tex. 2012).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

KEITH P. ELLISON, District Judge.

Pending before the Court are Plaintiffs Motion for Partial Summary Judgment (Doc. No. 32), and Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment (Doc. No. 35). After considering the motions, all responses thereto, and the applicable law, the Court finds that Plaintiffs motion must be DENIED, and Defendant’s motion must be GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART.

I. BACKGROUND

Plaintiff Michael Chicca alleges violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”), 29 U.S.C. §§ 201-219, by St. Luke’s Episcopal Health System (“Defendant” or “St. Luke’s”). In considering Chicca’s FLSA claim, the Court first must consider the nature of Chicca’s employment at St. Luke’s.

Chicca obtained an undergraduate degree in Computer Science Programming from North Harris County College in 1986. (Chicca Dep. at 9:16-25, Doc. No. 35-L.) In 1998, Chicca interviewed for the posi[780]*780tion of Information Protection Analyst at St. Luke’s. (Id. at 35:17-25.) In March 1998, Chicca was hired as Information Protection Analyst in the Information Protection Department of St. Luke’s, with a salary of $4834/month. (Offer Letter, Doc. No. 35 — Q.) By 2007, Chicca was making $6,801 monthly, or approximately $81,000 per year. (Chicca Pay Stub, Doc. No. 35-R.) During the last three years of Chicca’s employment, Chicca’s direct supervisor was Elizabeth Morton. (Morton Aff. ¶ 12, Doc. No. 35-D.) Morton reported to Deborah Williams, the director of the department. (Id.)

The parties dispute the nature of Chic-ca’s responsibilities at St. Luke’s. However, there are some basic facts about which there is no disagreement. St. Luke’s is a hospital system that has a number of employees, and a variety of departments. (Morton Aff. ¶ 4; Chicca Deck ¶ 4, January 14, 2012, Doc. No. 40-1 (“Chicca Declaration No. 1”).) One of the departments within St. Luke’s is the Information Technology Department (“IT”), which serves the varying technology-related needs of St. Luke’s. (Id.) IT is sub-divided into teams; one such team is Security Services group, which provides information protection and security. (Id. ¶ 8.) The group is responsible for ensuring that proper security measures are in effect, and certifies that technology applications utilized by St. Luke’s comply with security policies and standards. (Id. ¶ 10.) The group also ensures that secure data, including patient records and employee information, is accessible only by employees who have a legitimate reason to access the information. (Id.)

The Security Services group employs Information Protection (“IP”) analysts. IP analysts can make up to $98,000 per year, and are classified as exempt employees under the FLSA. (Id. ¶ 11.) According to Chicca’s supervisor, he was employed as a Senior IP Analyst. (Id. ¶ 12.)1 Although the contours of Chicca’s role at St. Luke’s are contested, the parties generally agree that Chicca worked on projects wherein he had to ensure that a particular software application was in line with St. Luke’s security standards. They also agree that Chicca worked on responding to Access Control Entitlement Systems (“ACES”) requests, which allow St. Luke’s users to seek access to various software applications. The specific nature of these tasks (and others), including the extent to which Chicca completed them with independence and discretion, is in dispute.

Defendant’s characterization of Chicca’s responsibilities relies primarily upon descriptions of Chicca’s work drawn from resumes that Chicca created after his departure from St. Luke’s in 2008, as well as Chicca’s deposition early in this litigation.2 Defendant also relies upon descriptions of Chicca’s duties contained in performance [781]*781reviews. Chicca relies primarily upon his own declarations, in which he classifies his primary duties as “limited to entering and updating the user profiles, security classifications, and security access codes” for Defendant’s employees. (Chicca Decl. No. 1 ¶¶ 12, 17.) Chicca did not, he explains, “write new programs, design new hardware, or re-arrange the configurations of computers.” (Id. ¶ 22.) According to Chicca, his role in creating user profiles, security groups, and access codes was essentially one of data entry. (Id.)

St. Luke’s describes Chicca’s responsibilities in different terms. According to St. Luke’s, in the role of Senior IP Analyst, Chicca’s primary responsibility was to “maintain the security of local and remote information resources.” (Chicca Resume, Doc. No. 35-N.) In this role, Chicca also served on “project teams.” (Chicca Dep. at 50:11-25.) One such project team worked on replacing a “materials management application,” called “PMM.” (Id. at 51:1-13.) Chicca’s role in this project was to enter user accounts and assign the proper security roles to those user accounts. (Id. at 51:16-20.) In working on this project, Chicca also created a document reflecting the procedures to be followed by the IP department in utilizing the PMM application. (Id. at 58:7-13.) Another task that Chicca performed in connection with projects, including the PMM project, was consulting with users to test the software being implemented or changed in the project. (See, e.g., Chicca Dep. at 60:19-25, 64:14-19.) In addition to Chicca’s work on projects like the PMM project, Chicca was also responsible for responding to ACES requests. (Morton Aff. ¶ 15.) However, Chicca indicates that, while he input these requests, he did not decide what level of security access any employee would have. (Chicca Decl. No. 1 ¶ 15.)

Chicca was also involved in the installation of new versions to software, or “upgrades,” which were provided by the same vendors who provided the original software. (Chicca Decl. ¶ 9.) Chicca indicates that the extent of his involvement with upgrades was to re-enter or import security access information after the new version of the program was installed. Because the installation of an upgrade required the participation of a number of computer technical support departments, the computer technical support division held daily “change management” meetings to discuss the status of plans to install upgrades. (Chicca Decl. ¶ 11.) Chicca contends that, although he “nominally chaired these meetings,” he had “no authority to direct any other department or employee.” (Id.) Chicca’s supervisor similarly acknowledges that Chicca’s role during the meetings was to advance the slides on the presentation and take notes of the discussion, and that he did not have the authority to set the agenda for the meetings or to schedule the upgrades. (Morton Dep. at 69-71, Doc. No. 32-D.)

Another responsibility that Chicca describes in his resume and deposition is work with internal and external auditors. In his resume, Chicca indicates that he “worked closely with internal and external auditors and senior company management.” (Doc. No. 35-N.) The purpose of these audits, according to Chicca’s deposition, was to ensure that users had access to the information in the application that they needed. (Chicca Dep. at 48:7-9.) These audits were performed on 28 to 30 applications that the IP group serviced; each of these applications was audited once every six months, with audits taking between two weeks and one month to complete. (Chicca Dep.

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Bluebook (online)
858 F. Supp. 2d 777, 2012 WL 844899, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/chicca-v-st-lukes-episcopal-health-system-txsd-2012.