On February 22, 2016, Arbitrator Marc Greenbaum issued an injury leave award in favor of Mass Coaltion of Police and Rehoboth Police Lt. Bruce Dube. A copy of the Award is attached. Mass COPs case was presented and argued by Sandulli Grace Attorney Amy Laura Davidson.

The case involved a reoccurrence and exacerbation of a previous injury that Lt. Dube had suffered in a cruiser accident in 1990. The accident damaged one of his cranial nerves causing him to have double vision. He was able to compensate for it for many years by tilting his head or blinking. Last December, Bruce’s condition deteriorated and he was no longer able to compensate for the double vision.

Lt. Dube had 27 years of unblemished service. He rose through the ranks to Lieutenant. The medical evidence that his condition was work related was uncontroverted. Even the Town’s doctor found that to be the case. Although the Chief originally placed Bruce on IOD, he reversed that decision and deducted his sick leave back to February 2015. The Town dragged its feet causing Lt. Dube to run out of all of his accumulated sick and vacation time. He went off the payroll in early December 2015 and remained so until the Award issued.

Arbitrator Greenbaum issued his award in under two weeks. He found that the Town violated the contract by failing to place Lt. Dube on injured on duty leave. He also held that the Town violated the contract by switching Bruce’s shift assignment to the day shift while he was incapacitated resulting in a loss of @ $95/week. Arbitrator Greenbaum issued a make whole order requiring the Town to restore all the accumulated time that Bruce was forced to use, compensate him for back pay and place him on IOD status going forward.

The parties are currently engaged in discussions about the damages owed under the Award. The amount owed is in excess of $50,000. In addition, the Town has agreed to reimburse Lt Dube nearly $9,000 for the taxes that were unlawfully withheld from his pay while he was incapacitated.

Read the arbitrator’s award.

On Saturday May 7th, the Boston Bar Association will be holding its 43rd Annual Workshop for Public Sector Labor Relations Specialists at Langdell Hall, Harvard Law School. The program is designed to familiarize lay people and attorneys who specialize in labor relations with current trends in collective bargaining and other issues affecting public employees. This year’s program features a review of significant labor law decisions issued in the past year followed by a panel of representatives from the Department of Labor Relations and the Joint Labor Management Committee who will review recent developments in their agencies. A second panel addresses the perils and pitfalls of workplace investigations including Weingarten and Fifth Amendment Rights. The conference is co-chaired by Amy Laura Davidson of Sandulli Grace, P. C., Brian Magner of Deutsch, Williams, Brooks, DeRensis & Holland, P. C., and Suffolk University Professor of Law Marc Greenbaum.

In contract negotiations between the Town of Braintree and the Braintree Police Officers Association, MCOP Local 365, the Town proposed the new position of Community Service Officer (CSO).  The Town proposed the CSO as a specialty position that could be filled without regard to seniority, an exception to the usual practice. The Town also proposed to “flex” the officers’ schedules, which meant that the officers would only receive overtime if they actually worked more than eight hours in a day – not if they were required to work an entirely different shift because of the needs of the job.

The contract language did not specify how the CSOs would be compensated.   However, the Town agreed that the CSOs would work a flexible schedule “in the same fashion as currently worked by the Narcotics Unit.” This was sufficient to convince the union to agree to the proposal, because the narcotics detectives worked a flexible schedule, and were paid the night shift differential all the time. The night shift differential made up for the negative aspects of the position, and “sold” the proposal to the union.

Once the position was filled, however, the Town refused to pay the CSOs the night shift differential, taking the position that it was not required to do so because the pay rate was not stated in the contract. The union filed for arbitration. On January 20, 2016, the arbitrator issued his award, agreeing with the Union and ordering the Town to pay CSOs the nights shift differential. (The award can be viewed here.)

This is an important victory for the Massachusetts Coalition of Police and the Braintree Police Officers Association. The arbitrator acknowledged that, by agreeing to a specialty position which the Chief could fill without regard to seniority, the union was obviously making a concession, and it would not be reasonable to expect the union to do so without getting something in return. In this case, what the union expected to get in return was the night shift differential. The arbitrator, Timothy Buckalew, showed great respect for the challenges of police collective bargaining. It was a hard-fought and well deserved victory, and I congratulate the Braintree Police Officers Association!

On June 30, 2015, public sector workers across Massachusetts won an important victory at the Department of Labor (‘DLR’). In the case of City of Springfield and AFSCME, MUP-12-2466, the DLR held that the city of Springfield could not install GPS tracking devices on employee vehicles without first bargaining with the employees’ union—the AFSCME, Council 93. You can read the full decision here: http://www.mass.gov/lwd/labor-relations/recent-decisions/2015-decisions/june-2015/mup-12-2466-cerb-decision.pdf. Moving forward, this decision will help unions to better protect employees on how GPS information is used and what circumstances GPS information will be accessed.

This dispute began in 2012, when the city of Springfield began secretly installing GPS tracking devices on public utility vehicles. These devices allowed the city to determine employees’ work locations, idle time, speed, distances driven, and number of stops—all in real time. Before these devices were installed, the city had no way of gathering this information and did not require employees to report it.

The DLR held that these devices were illegal because they altered an existing condition of employment without first bargaining with the employees’ union. These devices altered an existing condition of employment because they “plainly changed the type and amount of information” available to the city. On these grounds, the DLR distinguished this case from two previous cases: City of Worcester, MUP-05-4409 (2007) and Duxbury School Committee, 25 MLC 22 (1998).

Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly interviewed Jennifer Rubin, a partner at Sandulli Grace, about the case. She explained that this decision is a “big deal”. It is the first time that a case in Massachusetts has held that the decision to implement GPS devices, and the impacts of that decision is something that unions must be given the opportunity to bargain. Attorney Rubin also added even if a public employer had previously monitored employees in some manner, unions should still demand to bargain if the employer considers installing GPS devices “because the decision says if the type or amount of information tracked by the GPS is different from before, that could form the basis for a bargaining obligation.”

This case represents an important victory about the employer’s bargaining obligations. As new technology continues to alter the employer-employee relationship, we should always remember the importance of protecting the employee’s privacy and how that information that is produced by that new technology is used.

Court Decision Reinstating Boston Police Officer Wins Sandulli Grace Press Coverage
The case involved the firing of veteran Boston police officer and BPPA member David Williams for allegedly using excessive force during an arrest. The arbitrator found that Williams had not used excessive force and had acted in compliance with the Police Department’s rules and policies in arresting a belligerent intoxicated citizen in the North End of Boston on the night before St. Patrick’s Day. Specifically, the arbitrator rejected the City’s claim that Williams had used a chokehold on the arrestee.

The City of Boston appealed the arbitrator’s ruling to the Superior Court, arguing that the Boston Police Commissioner had unfettered power under state law to determine when an officer had used excessive force and that arbitrators did not have the power to overturn his disciplinary which upheld the award. Judge Dennis J. Curran in the Superior Court threw out the City’s claims. Instead, the judge agreed with the BPPA and its attorneys that disciplinary actions and the factual underpinnings thereof are subject to review through the grievance and arbitration procedures that the City and the BPPA have collectively bargained. In particular, the findings of a neutral arbitrator selected by the parties on matters of fact, such as whether or not Williams used a chokehold, are sacrosanct, and may not be overturned by a reviewing court.

Judge Curran issued his decision in City of Boston v. BPPA on June 29, 2015. The Boston Globe ran the story on the front page of the Metro section on July 22, 2015 with a picture of David Williams and a quote from Attorney Becker. You can find the link here.
Massachusetts Lawyer’s Weekly ran a front-page article on the case in its July 27, 2015 edition in which Attorney Becker was quoted extensively. The link is here.

One might speculate that the media attention to the Williams case might stem from the chokehold allegation – even though the arbitrator found otherwise – given the press coverage of incidents in New York and elsewhere. Some commentators raised concerns about those incidents because the police officers involved were white and the people they arrested were black. In this case, interestingly, the press did not draw attention to the fact that Williams is black and the person he arrested is white.

Ever feel like you don’t quite get it? Where something seems so simple, but maybe, just maybe, there’s something you’re missing? Like, in the case of the Waltham Police Contract where it says that a decision of an arbitrator will be “final and binding,” doesn’t that mean that it should be, well, final? Or, binding? Well, unfortunately the City seems to have different definitions for that word, as it continues to challenge the November 2012 decision of Arbitrator Michael Stutz overturning the fifteen day suspension of Officer Paul Tracey. It was a straightforward decision, the arbitrator overturned a suspension finding that the alleged victim was no believable. Couldn’t have been more run of the mill. Unfortunately, the City appealed in true “throw everything at the wall and see if something sticks” fashion.

Back on March 4, 2014, I blogged about how Superior Court Judge S. Jane Haggerty summarily upheld the decision, rejecting all of the City’s arguments (that blog entry is here).

Surprisingly, the City was not done, and appealed Judge Haggerty’s decision to the Appeals Court. Last week, in a summary decision a panel of Appeals Court justices upheld the Superior Court upholding the Arbitrator (you can read the decision here). Similar to the Superior Court, the Panel rejected all of the City’s myriad arguments, concluding “we discern no error in the Superior Court judge’s reasoned decision and conclusions of law in denying the city’s motion for summary judgement.”

The City could still ask the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court to consider the case (the SJC could decline to do so). On behalf of the Waltham Police Union, Officer Tracey, the taxpayers of Waltham (who continue to foot the bill for the absurd appeals), myself, and good people everywhere who understand what “final and binding” means, here’s hoping the City decides to simply comply with the award instead.

Download theTracey appeals court decision

On January 14, 2015, arbitrator Richard Boulanger issued an important injury leave award in favor of the Massachusetts Coalition of Police and its affiliate, the Ipswich Police Association, Local 310.  The arbitrator granted Ipswich Police Officer Aaron Woodworth injury leave for a three month period in 2014 when Officer Woodworth was out of work recovering from Continue reading →