Collective Bargaining Reform v. Labor Rel.
| Decision Date | 05 March 2002 |
| Docket Number | SJC-08468 |
| Citation | 436 Mass. 197 |
| Parties | COLLECTIVE BARGAINING REFORM ASSOCIATION vs. LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION & another.(FN1) Docket No.:MASSACHUSETTS SUPREME COURT County: Suffolk |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Summary: Labor, Collective bargaining, Bargaining unit, Certification and election. Public Employment, Collective bargaining. Labor Relations Commission. Administrative Law, Decision, Judicial review.
Civil action commenced in the Superior Court Department on February 22, 1999.
The case was heard by Stephen E. Neel, J., on a motion for judgment on the pleadings.
The Supreme Judicial Court granted an application for direct appellate review.
Alan J. McDonald (Mark A. Hickernell with him) for the plaintiff.
John B. Cochran for the defendant.
David B. Rome for the intervener.
Shelley B. Kroll, Donald J. Siegel & Elizabeth A. Sloane, for Massachusetts AFL-CIO, amicus curiae, submitted a brief.
Present: Marshall, C.J., Greaney, Ireland, Spina, Cowin, Sosman, & Cordy, JJ.
A judge in the Superior Court dismissed a complaint for judicial review filed, pursuant to G. L. c. 30A, § 14, by the plaintiff, the Collective Bargaining Reform Association (COBRA), a labor organization. The complaint challenged a decision of the Labor Relations Commission (commission) dismissing COBRA's petition to sever a group of public employees from an existing bargaining unit and to allow COBRA to become that group's exclusive bargaining representative. The commission dismissed the petition after a hearing and without ordering a representation election. The judge in turn dismissed COBRA's complaint in the Superior Court on the ground that commission decisions made on certification proceedings are not subject to immediate judicial review. On appeal, COBRA claims that the commission's dismissal of its petition constitutes a "final decision of an agency in an adjudicatory proceeding," entitling it to judicial review pursuant to G. L. c. 30A, § 14. We granted COBRA's application for direct appellate review and now affirm the judgment of the Superior Court dismissing its complaint.
We briefly summarize the facts and procedural posture of this appeal. In 1967, the city of Boston (city) recognized the Service Employees International Union, Local 285, AFL-CIO (SEIU) as the exclusive collective bargaining representative for a wide range of nonprofessional employees, including a group now known as communication equipment operators (operators). The operators are employed by the city as part of its police department's bureau of field services and are assigned to work at police headquarters. Their primary duty is to serve as call takers on the city's enhanced 911 emergency telephone system, which is staffed by the operators twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. The operators register each incoming call into a sophisticated computer-aided dispatch system and assign to each call one of approximately 200 possible codes based on information provided by the caller. The assigned code triggers a level of response from various agencies, such as police, fire, or emergency medical services, and entering the wrong code into the system may lead to an inadequate or delayed response to the emergency situation.
In 1994, following the installation of the present computer-aided dispatch system and an enhanced 911 system, the operators approached SEIU regarding the possibility of a position upgrade to reflect what they believed to be their unique training, responsibilities, and working conditions. SEIU was unsuccessful in achieving the requested position upgrade, despite repeated meetings with city officials and the filing of a compensation grade appeal with the city's office of labor relations.
Due to the city's failure to grant the operators a position upgrade, as well as to general concerns about the effectiveness of SEIU negotiators on behalf of the operators in the matter, on January 21, 1997, COBRA filed a petition with the commission, pursuant to G. L. c. 150E, § 4, on behalf of a substantial number of operators. By its petition, COBRA sought to sever the operators from the bargaining unit represented by SEIU, for the purpose of holding a separate representation election.2 SEIU was allowed to intervene in the proceedings before the commission. Both SEIU and the city (a party to the proceedings as the operators' public employer) opposed severance of the operators from the SEIU bargaining unit.
Negotiations taking place between the city and SEIU on a new contract for city workers then came to a temporary halt. On February 25, 1997, SEIU filed a prohibited practice charge with the commission alleging that the city had refused to continue negotiations with SEIU during the pendency of COBRA's petition. During the following months, SEIU staff and bargaining unit members circulated a series of petitions, letters, and published statements to individuals associated with the petition. These materials urged COBRA either to withdraw its petition or to allow negotiations to continue between SEIU and the city on a new contract.3 COBRA did not withdraw its petition, and on August 15, 1997, SEIU withdrew its prohibited practice charge against the city. The withdrawal apparently was based on the city's commitment to resume bargaining with respect to SEIU, excluding the operators.
The commission investigated COBRA's petition and issued a notice of hearing to the parties, pursuant to G. L. c. 150E, § 4. This statute provides that when "a substantial number of the employees in a bargaining unit wish to be represented by the petitioner[] or... alleg[e] that the exclusive representative therefor no longer represents a majority of the employees therein, [the commission] shall investigate, and if it has reasonable cause to believe that a substantial question of representation exists, shall provide for an appropriate hearing upon due notice." If the commission, after the hearing, had determined that there was a "controversy concerning the representation" of the operators, it would then have been required, pursuant to § 4, to "direct an election by secret ballot or... use any other suitable method to determine whether, or by which employee organization" the operators desired to be represented, and to "certify any employee organization which received a majority of the votes in such election as the exclusive representative" of the operators. Following a lengthy hearing, however, the commission dismissed the petition without directing an election.
As explained in a fifty-seven page decision, the commission's consideration of COBRA's petition followed the two- part test, set forth in City of Beverly, 1 M.L.C. 1108 (1974), for evaluating the merits of petitions seeking severance from an existing bargaining unit. The commission determined that the operators had satisfied the first prong of the test, because they had demonstrated that they were a "functionally distinct appropriate unit with some special interests sufficiently distinct from other bargaining unit members." However, with respect to the second prong of the test, the commission concluded that the operators had failed to establish that their distinct interests "have caused or are likely to cause serious conflicts or divisions within the bargaining unit."
COBRA filed a complaint for judicial review, pursuant to G. L. c. 30A, § 14, and, thereafter, a motion for judgment on the pleadings. The judge denied COBRA's motion and ordered its complaint dismissed, relying on prior decisions of this court and the Appeals Court that hold that, absent extraordinary circumstances, decisions rendered in representation proceedings before the commission are not final adjudications open to immediate judicial review. See Worcester Indus. Tech. Inst. Instructors Ass'n Inc. v. Labor Relations Comm'n, 357 Mass. 118, 120-121 (1970); City Manager of Medford v. Labor Relations Comm'n, 353 Mass. 519, 523-524 (1968); Local 1111, Int'l Ass'n of Fire Fighters v. Labor Relations Comm'n, 14 Mass. App. Ct. 236, 238 (1982); Sullivan v. Labor Relations Comm'n, 5 Mass. App Ct. 532, 535 (1977).4
1. COBRA claims that the commission's dismissal of its petition falls within the ambit of G. L. c. 30A, § 14, which provides that, unless expressly precluded by law, "any person... aggrieved by a final decision of any agency in an adjudicatory proceeding... shall be entitled to a judicial review thereof." This claim is premised on COBRA's contention that because the commission dismissed its petition without holding an election, COBRA is left with no available avenue of recourse in which to challenge the commission's decision, and thus, the commission's dismissal of its petition was a "final decision in an adjudicatory proceeding" subject to plenary judicial review. We disagree.
This court steadfastly has denied the availability of judicial review of certification questions in the absence of an unfair labor dispute. The principle that a certification decision is not reviewable until the commission has issued or denied an order was first enunciated in Jordan Marsh Co. v. Labor Relations Comm'n, 312 Mass. 597, 601-602 (1942). In City Manager of Medford v. Labor Relations Comm'n, supra at 523, this court applied the principle in the case of public employees, but foresaw possible, very limited exceptions to the general rule: In a subsequent case, where the commission had made a choice between two unions, and the excluded union sought review, ...
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