Foreign lifeguards stiffed as employer shuts down
By DAVID DISHNEAU - 2 days ago

HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) - The U.S. Labor Department said Friday it is investigating possible wage violations by a Maryland-based pool-management firm that abruptly closed last week, leaving hundreds of lifeguards - including many European students - unpaid.

Kensington-based Century Pool Management provided summertime lifeguards for 600 pools in Maryland, northern Virginia, Massachusetts, New York and New Jersey, according to the company's Web site.

Labor Department spokesman Loren Smith confirmed the investigation, which was first reported in The Washington Post.

"It has to do with possible violations of the statute that the Wage and Hour Division administers," Smith said. The department did not yet know the total number of workers affected.

Company representatives didn't immediately return telephone calls and e-mails from The Associated Press.

The foreign workers include at least 81 from Serbia who contacted their nation's embassy in Washington after Century e-mailed them on Sept. 12 that it had closed, said Dejan Radulovic, head of the embassy's consular section.

"It's a really extremely bad experience for them," Radulovic said. "We hope this issue will be solved very quickly since many of them have no money for basic needs or to pay bills before they leave for Serbia."

He said the embassy encouraged the unpaid workers to contact the Labor Department.

Four students from the Czech Republic contacted their nation's embassy and said that as many as 30 Czechs had been told by Century that they won't be paid because the company is pursuing a bankruptcy filing, embassy spokesman Daniel Novy said.

An AP search of federal bankruptcy court records found no filings by Century or Vetal this year.

Novy said the students, many of whom were recruited by Century at Czech universities, told the embassy they had received paychecks during the summer but some had bounced. Some workers said they also were owed money for housing.

Many of the workers were granted temporary "J" visas under the Summer Work/Travel Exchange Visitor Program administered by the U.S. State Department, Novy said. The students typically paid recruiters $2,000 and were promised more than $2,000 in earnings.

The Post reported that the students expected to make as much as $6,000 over the summer from Century.

The visiting workers have return plane tickets but some may be charged fees if the dispute forces them to change their departure dates, Novy said.

Century and other pool management companies hire many foreign workers for seasonal jobs. In a 2004 AP interview, Century recruitment director Rob Fox said workers from former Soviet bloc countries accounted for 20 to 30 percent of the 2,000 people he hired that year.

Lauren Stack, a spokeswoman for the Association of Pool and Spa Professionals, a trade group based in Alexandria, Va., said Century didn't renew its membership this year.