Cumberland Teachers Ass'n v. Cumberland Sch. Comm.

• Decision Date: 29 June 2012
• Docket Number: No. 2011–145–Appeal.,2011–145–Appeal.
• Citation: 45 A.3d 1188,281 Ed. Law Rep. 619
• Parties: CUMBERLAND TEACHERS ASSOCIATION v. CUMBERLAND SCHOOL COMMITTEE.
• Court: Rhode Island Supreme Court

45 A.3d 1188

281 Ed. Law Rep. 619

CUMBERLAND TEACHERS ASSOCIATION

v.CUMBERLAND SCHOOL COMMITTEE.

No. 2011–145–Appeal.

Supreme Court of Rhode Island.

June 29, 2012.

Vincent P. Santaniello, Esq., Cranston, for Plaintiff.

Jeffrey W. Kasle, Esq., for Defendant.

Present: SUTTELL, C.J., GOLDBERG, FLAHERTY, ROBINSON, and INDEGLIA, JJ.

OPINION

Justice FLAHERTY, for the Court.

The Cumberland Teachers Association (union), appeals to this Court from the entry of judgment confirming an arbitrator's award in favor of the Cumberland School Committee (school committee). This case came before the Supreme Court for oral argument on May 2, 2012, pursuant to an order directing the parties to appear and show cause why the issues in this case should not summarily be decided. After hearing the arguments of counsel and reviewing the memoranda submitted on behalf of the parties, we are satisfied that cause has not been shown and we will proceed to decide the appeal without further briefing or argument. For the reasons set forth in this opinion, we affirm the judgment of the Superior Court.

Facts and Travel

In the late night hours of August 30, 2008, after engaging in protracted negotiations that had taken place over a number of months, the school committee and the union at last agreed upon a three-year collective bargaining agreement (CBA) that would govern their relations for the academic years of 2006–2007, 2007–2008, and 2008–2009. However, the parties soon discovered that they had left the negotiating table with two very different understandings of how a key component of their agreement would be implemented. In the CBA, the parties had agreed that the teachers would transition from a twelve-step salary schedule to a ten-step salary schedule. Until 2006, Cumberland teachers advanced along a twelve-step salary schedule; this was a process that departed from that of most of the state's teachers, who operated on a ten-step schedule.¹

Also of concern to the parties during that round of negotiation were teachers' salaries. Cumberland teachers were compensated at well below the state average. In an effort to attract and retain the most qualified and talented teachers, the school committee conceded that the salaries had to be increased; it also agreed that the current salary structure should be collapsed from a twelve-step system to the much more common ten-step system. ²

In the spring of 2006, the parties began negotiating the terms of a new CBA to succeed the contract that was set to expire at the end of August. Because the teachers were concerned with a lack of progress, they asked that a state mediator be appointed. Finally, with the mediator's assistance, the parties reached an agreement late in the night of August 30, 2006. The process was, as is typical, harried and exhausting for both sides. Proposals and counterproposals were shuffled between the parties, with handwritten edits, notes, and comments present on almost every page of each proposal. A number of charts also were compiled by the parties as they endeavored to establish the mechanism by which teachers would be transitioned from a twelve-step schedule to a ten-step schedule during the life of the new agreement. Eventually, the parties came to closure on a new agreement that would provide for semiannual pay raises of 2 percent during the 2007–2008 and 2008–2009 years and would establish a new schedule for step increases.

Instead of immediately collapsing the existing schedule from twelve steps to ten, the parties agreed to transition incrementally to the new ten-step schedule. Specifically, the CBA provided that during the 2006–2007 year, the salary schedule would be reduced to eleven steps. However, beginning with the 2007–2008 year, the salary schedule would have only ten steps. During the 2008–2009 year, teachers would continue to be compensated in accordance with a ten-step salary schedule.

The first year under the new agreement passed uneventfully, and there was no dispute between the parties about the placement of teachers on the salary scale for the 2006–2007 contract year. But, in September 2007, a significant disagreement arose between the parties about how that progression should take place. Because the parties were unable to resolve their differences, a grievance was filed by the union, and the matter eventually was referred to arbitration pursuant to the terms of the CBA.

An arbitrator was selected and the parties agreed that the issue to be decided by the arbitrator was whether “the Cumberland School Committee place[d] the aggrieved teachers at the correct salary level for the 2007–08 school year?” ³ Four days of hearings were held in the spring of 2008, and the arbitrator reviewed significant memoranda and supplemental memoranda on the issue. The parties presented evidence, including each party's version of the applicable principles for the initial salary step placement in year one, and the subsequent placement for the 2007–2008 year and the 2008–2009 year. During the hearings, several witnesses testified for each side about the negotiations and mediation, including the development of the salary schedule that was appended to the tentative agreement.⁴

On December 22, 2008, the arbitrator issued an award in which he denied the union's grievances for the school years of 2007–2008 and 2008–2009. Dissatisfied with the award, the union filed a motion in the Superior Court to vacate it, and the school committee filed a cross-motion to confirm the award. On July 21, 2010, a justice of the Superior Court denied the union's motion to vacate the award and granted the school committee's motion to confirm. The judgment confirming the arbitration award was entered on August 30, 2010; the union filed a timely notice of appeal to this Court on September 9, 2010.

Before us, the union argues that the arbitrator manifestly disregarded a contract provision when he found that there was no written agreement about how the new salary schedule would be implemented for the 2007–2008 year. The union contends that the arbitrator subjectively concluded that the union's transition proposal, which it contends had been accepted by the school committee, would have produced a disproportionately high pay increase for some teachers. Therefore, the union insists that the arbitrator acted irrationally when he “reformed” the salary schedule because it was in direct conflict with the “agreed-upon” transitional plan for the salary schedule.

The school committee responds by relying on this Court's exceptionally limited standard of review with respect to arbitration awards. It argues that the arbitrator's decision drew its essence from the CBA and was based upon a passably plausible interpretation of that agreement. The school committee also maintains that there is no support for the union's position that there was a mutually “agreed-upon” transition plan. It argues that there was a complete lack of any convincing, competent, or credible evidence of such an agreement before the arbitrator.

Standard of Review

“We review arbitral awards under an exceptionally deferential standard as a means of ensuring that parties may benefit from arbitration as a relatively informal and expedient alternative to litigation in the court system.” North Providence School Committee v. North Providence Federation of Teachers, Local 920, American Federation of Teachers, 945 A.2d 339, 347 (R.I.2008). “[T]he role of the judiciary in the arbitration process is ‘extremely limited.’ ” Aponik v. Lauricella, 844 A.2d 698, 703 (R.I.2004) (quoting Purvis Systems, Inc. v. American Systems Corp., 788 A.2d 1112, 1114 (R.I.2002)). “The authority of the courts in this jurisdiction to review an arbitral award is statutorily prescribed and is limited in nature.” City of East Providence v. International Association of Firefighters Local 850, 982 A.2d 1281, 1285 (R.I.2009) (quoting North Providence School Committee, 945 A.2d at 344). “Public policy favors the finality of arbitration awards, and such awards enjoy a presumption of validity.” Id.; accord North Providence School Committee, 945 A.2d at 344.

General Laws 1956 § 28–9–18 specifies three grounds under which an arbitration award may be vacated: (1) when the award was procured by fraud; (2) where the arbitrator exceeds his powers or so imperfectly executed them that a mutual, final and definite award upon the subject matter was not made; or (3) if there was no valid submission or contract and the objection has been raised at the arbitration. In addition, this Court has held that an award may be vacated if “the award was irrational or if the arbitrator manifestly disregarded the law.” North Providence School Committee, 945 A.2d at 344 (quoting Purvis Systems, Inc., 788 A.2d at 1115).

“The court has no authority to vacate the arbitrator's award absent a manifest disregard of a contractual provision, a completely irrational result, a decision that is contrary to public policy, or an award that determined a matter that was not arbitrable in the first place.” Fleet Construction Co. v. Town of North Smithfield, 713 A.2d 1241, 1243 (R.I.1998); accord Rhode Island Brotherhood of Correctional Officers v. State Department of Corrections, 707 A.2d 1229, 1234 (R.I.1998). “[A] manifest disregard of the law requires ‘something beyond and different from a mere error in the law or failure on the part of the arbitrators to understand or apply the law.’ ” City of East Providence, 982 A.2d at 1286 (quoting North Providence School Committee, 945 A.2d at 344). “[A] manifest disregard of the law occurs when an arbitrator understands and correctly articulates the law, but then proceeds to disregard it.” Id.

“[A]s long as an arbitrator's award ‘draws its essence’ from the contract and is based upon a ‘passably plausible’ interpretation of the contract, it is within the arbitrator's authority and our review must end.” City of East Providence, 982 A.2d at 1285 (quoting Town of Coventry v....