The Oregon Court of Appeals has rejected challenges by two employee unions, which argued that the state engaged in unlawful labor practices while negotiating their contracts four years ago.
The contracts eventually approved for corrections officers and state police troopers were in line with what other unions got in the 2003-05 budget cycle: No cost-of-living or longevity pay increases were granted, but they got a continuation of fully paid health insurance premiums and a one-time payment of $350 to each employee in 2005.
The Association of Oregon Corrections Employees and the Oregon State Police Officers Association went to the state Employment Relations Board after arbitrators settled their contracts on the state's terms. They accused state managers of failing to negotiate in good faith because their unions were not offered the possibility of a better deal than that promised to Local 503 of Service Employees International Union, which represents the largest group of state workers.
But the state board dismissed the complaints, and a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals ruled this week in separate suits filed by the unions that the board acted correctly.
"The board did not err in concluding that the state's hard-line bargaining position (regarding the contracts) was dictated not by a promise made to SEIU, but by the real budgetary constraints facing the state in difficult economic times," Judge Robert Wollheim wrote for the court.
The 1973 law allowing collecting bargaining between governments and employee unions makes it an unlawful labor practice for a government to refuse to bargain in "good faith."
Although the state has frozen cost-of-living pay increases before, notably between mid-1993 and mid-1997, there had not been a recent freeze on "merit" increases, steps based largely on longevity on the job.
But incoming Gov. Ted Kulongoski and lawmakers faced a budget shortfall of more than $1 billion as they started a record-length session in 2003.
"Given the economic hand it was dealt, the state's wage-freeze proposals cannot be said to have been 'unduly harsh or unreasonable,' " Wollheim wrote.
(statesmanjournal.com)
