City of Lewiston v. Maine State Employees Ass'n

• Decision Date: 16 March 1994
• Citation: 638 A.2d 739
• Parties: 146 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2006 CITY OF LEWISTON, et al. v. MAINE STATE EMPLOYEES ASSOCIATION, et al.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

Page 739

638 A.2d 739

146 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2006

CITY OF LEWISTON, et al. v. MAINE STATE EMPLOYEES ASSOCIATION, et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Argued Nov. 1, 1993.

Decided March 16, 1994.

George S. Isaacson (orally), Alfred C. Frawley, Daniel C. Stockford, Brann & Isaacson, Lewiston, for plaintiffs.

Hugh G.E. MacMahon, Portland, amicus curiae Maine School Bd. Ass'n.

Judith A. Dorsey (orally), Maine Labor Relations Bd., Timothy L. Belcher (orally), Maine State Employees Ass'n, Augusta, for defendants.

Before WATHEN, C.J., and ROBERTS, GLASSMAN, CLIFFORD, COLLINS, RUDMAN, and DANA, JJ.

DANA, Justice.

The Maine State Employees Association and the Maine Labor Relations Board (referred to individually as "MSEA" and "Board," and collectively as "appellants") appeal the order of the Superior Court (Androscoggin County, Delahanty, C.J.), which vacated a decision of the Board. Because the City of Lewiston and the Lewiston School Committee (the "Employers") did not file their appeal from the Board's decision within the fifteen-day period prescribed by 26 M.R.S.A. § 968(5)(F) (Supp.1993), ¹ we vacate the judgment and remand with instructions to dismiss the appeal.

I. Facts and Procedure

The Employers are subject to the provisions of the Municipal Public Employees Labor Relations Law, 26 M.R.S.A. §§ 961-974 (1988 & Supp.1993), which requires them to bargain collectively with their employees' agent, the MSEA. Id. at § 964(1)(E) (1988). The Employers and the MSEA were parties to a two-year collective bargaining agreement effective July 1, 1989 to June 30, 1991 (the "Agreement"), which provided that employees' wages would be subject to periodic step increases. After the Agreement expired, without a successor agreement in place, the Employers froze the wages at the rates in existence as of June 30, 1991.

In taking this action, the Employers adhered to the Board's "static status quo" rule for wages, adopted in Easton Teachers Ass'n v. Easton School Comm., No. 79-14 (Me.L.R.B. Mar. 13, 1979). Pursuant to the Easton rule, after a collective bargaining agreement expired with no new agreement in place, public employers could pay wages at the rates in existence as of the expiration date, unless the collective bargaining agreement provided otherwise. Three months after the Agreement expired, the Board reversed Easton, and adopted the "dynamic status quo" doctrine, which required a public employer, in the absence of a new collective bargaining agreement, to pay wages in accordance with the wage plan of the expired agreement, including any scheduled step increases. Auburn School Adm'rs Ass'n v. Auburn School Comm., No. 91-19 (Me.L.R.B. Oct. 8, 1991), consolidated appeals dismissed per stipulation, No. CV-91-459 XCV-91-464 (Me.Super.Ct., And.Cty., Apr. 24, 1992).

In December 1991, the MSEA filed prohibited practice complaints with the Board, alleging that the Employers failed to negotiate in good faith when they "unilaterally suspended" the step increases. Applying the new Auburn rule to the facts stipulated by the parties, the Board issued a decision on September 11, 1992, finding that the Employers' suspension of the Agreement's wage plan violated 26 M.R.S.A. § 964(1) (1988). ² The Board ordered the Employers to pay all step increases due the employees during the contractual hiatus and interest on amounts that remained unpaid after October 11, 1992.

Although the first page of the Board's order stated that it was issued on September 11, 1992, the final page omitted the date. The order advised the parties of their right to appeal, and instructed them to "file a complaint with the Superior Court within fifteen (15) days of the date of this decision." On September 14, the Board issued the order again, and filled in the September 11 date on the last page.

Because the fifteen-day deadline fell on Saturday, September 26, the complaint was due on Monday, September 28. On the preceding Friday, the Employers' counsel mailed a petition for review of the Board's decision to the Superior Court (Androscoggin County). Although the United States Post Office "service commitment" specifies a delivery period of one day for first class mail between Lewiston (the location of counsel's office) and Auburn (the location of the Superior Court), the clerk's office stamped the petition "RECEIVED SEP 29, 1992." The record contains no evidence to explain the delay.

Because the petition was not filed within the fifteen-day period prescribed by 26 M.R.S.A. § 968(5)(F), the MSEA filed a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction. In response, the Employers filed a motion requesting that the Superior Court accept the petition as having been filed on September 28, 1992 or, in the alternative, to grant a one-day enlargement of time after-the-fact. The Superior Court (Cole, J.) granted the motion for enlargement of time pursuant to M.R.Civ.P. 6(b), finding that the reliance of the Employers' counsel on the service standards of the post office, "followed by a failure to telephone the clerk's office to double-check on the clerk's timely receipt of the petition," was excusable neglect.

After a hearing on the merits, the Superior Court (Delahanty, C.J.) vacated the Board's order. The court concluded that the Board exceeded its authority by abandoning the static status quo doctrine and by ordering the Employers to pay the step increases. The MSEA and the Board filed this timely appeal.

II. Authority to Entertain Appeal

All of the parties to this appeal urge us to reach the issue of the Board's authority to adopt the dynamic status quo doctrine. Before we can reach this issue, however, we must first determine whether the Superior Court had the authority to entertain the appeal.

Section 968(5)(F) provides that parties may appeal a Board decision to the Superior Court provided they file a complaint "within 15 days of the date of issuance of the decision." The appellants argue that the Employers' untimely filing of the petition for review deprived the court of the power to entertain the appeal. The appellants further argue that the court lacked authority to grant the Employers' motion for enlargement of time pursuant to M.R.Civ.P. 6(b). We agree.

In Reed v. Halperin, 393 A.2d 160, 162 (Me.1978), we held that statutory periods of appeal are not subject to a court-ordered enlargement of time. See also Brown v. State, Dep't of Manpower Affairs, 426 A.2d 880, 887-888 (Me.1981) ("judicial enlargement of a statutorily provided period of appeal is not possible"). If a party does not file an appeal within the statutory period, the Superior Court has no legal power to entertain the appeal.

The Employers raise four arguments to overcome this deficiency, none of which is convincing. They first argue that the Superior Court acted within its discretion by granting the one-day extension. They assert that the court properly found that their counsel's reliance on the post office was "excusable neglect," pursuant to M.R.Civ.P. 6(b). In light of Reed and Brown, this argument has no merit.

The Employers then argue that the Superior Court could have concluded that the Board's decision was actually issued on September 14, the day on which the Board mailed a corrected copy to the parties. The Employers maintain that "[i]t would be unfair to litigants to measure an appeal period from the date that an...