Labor & Employment Law

Police disciplinary procedures may not be subject to Taylor Law negotiations

By Harvey Randall, Esq.

Police disciplinary procedures may not be subject to Taylor Law negotiations
In Matter of Patrolmen's Benevolent Assn. of City of N.Y., Inc. v New York State Pub. Empl. Relations Bd., 13 AD3d 879, affirmed, 6 NY3d 563 and Matter of Town of Orangetown v Orangetown Policemen's Benevolent Assn., 18 AD3d 879, modified, 6 NY3d 563

In the Patrolmen?s Benevolent Association case, the Court of Appeals held that police discipline may not be a subject of collective bargaining under the Taylor Law when the Legislature has expressly committed disciplinary authority over a police department to local officials. In the words of the court: The issue is not, as the unions argue, whether these enactments were intended by their authors to create an exception to the Taylor Law; obviously they were not, since they were passed decades before the Taylor Law existed. The issue is whether these enactments express a policy so important that the policy favoring collective bargaining should give way, and we conclude that they do.

The full decision is posted at:
http://nypublicpersonnellawarchives.blogspot.com/2008/03/police-disciplinary-procedures-may-not.html

Full post as published by New York Public Personnel Law on March 24, 2008 (boomark / email).