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Unilaterally deducting employee leave accruals and creating a noncontractual procedure for recouping holiday pay violated employer's duty to negotiate

Unilaterally deducting employee leave accruals and creating a noncontractual procedure for recouping holiday pay violated employer's duty to negotiate
Sullivan County Patrolman's Benevolent Association, Inc. and County of Sullivan and Sullivan County Sheriff, U-26725 [Source: PERB?s Recent Decisions posting on the Internet]

The Board affirmed the decision of the ALJ finding that the County violated the Taylor Law by unilaterally implementing a system for the recovery of leave accruals and holiday pay which a unit employee allegedly owed to the County and by deducting vacation, sick leave and personal leave from the employee's leave accrual. The Board found that the ALJ properly retained jurisdiction over the charge, which alleged violations of §§209a.1(a), (c), (d) and (e) of the Act.

The ALJ dismissed the (a) and (c) allegations for failure of proof and did not defer the (d) and (e) allegations, even though a decision with respect to those allegations necessitated interpretation of the expired collectively negotiated agreement.

The Board discussed and clarified both its jurisdictional and merits deferral policies regarding (d) and (e) allegations.

PERB affirmed the ALJ, finding that neither jurisdictional nor merits deferral was appropriate in this case because the ALJ had already decided the (a) and (c) allegations, the parties were holding the arbitration of the related grievance in abeyance pending the outcome of the improper practice proceeding and the County was not seeking deferral.

Reaching the merits of the case, the Board held that the County violated §§209a.1(d) and (e) of the Act when it unilaterally deducted leave accruals and set up a noncontractual procedure for recouping holiday pay from an employee who had been on GML §207 leave intermittently over the course of several months.

Full post as published by New York Public Personnel Law on July 20, 2010 (boomark / email).