Dubuque Community School Dist. v. Public Employment Relations Bd., 87-64

• Decision Date: 11 May 1988
• Docket Number: No. 87-64,87-64
• Citation: 424 N.W.2d 427
• Parties: 47 Ed. Law Rep. 300 DUBUQUE COMMUNITY SCHOOL DISTRICT, Petitioner-Appellee, v. PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS BOARD and Dubuque Education Association, Respondents-Appellants. DUBUQUE EDUCATION ASSOCIATION, Petitioner-Appellant, v. PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS BOARD, Respondent-Appellant.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Page 427

424 N.W.2d 427

47 Ed. Law Rep. 300

DUBUQUE COMMUNITY SCHOOL DISTRICT, Petitioner-Appellee, v. PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS BOARD and Dubuque Education Association, Respondents-Appellants.

DUBUQUE EDUCATION ASSOCIATION, Petitioner-Appellant, v. PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS BOARD, Respondent-Appellant.

No. 87-64.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

May 11, 1988.

Amy J. Mills, Des Moines, for appellant Public Employment Relations bd.

Charles E. Gribble of Sayre & Gribble, P.C., Des Moines, for respondent-appellant Dubuque Educ. Ass'n.

Stephen J. Juergens of Fuerste, Carew, Coyle, Juergens & Sudmeier, Dubuque, for petitioner-appellee Dubuque Community School Dist.

Considered by McGIVERIN, C.J., and HARRIS, CARTER, NEUMAN, and ANDREASEN, JJ.

NEUMAN, Justice.

In May 1985, the Dubuque Education Association (DEA) petitioned the Iowa Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) to amend its collective bargaining unit to add substitute teachers qualifying for inclusion under the Public Employment Relations Act (Act), Iowa Code chapter 20 (1987). The Dubuque Community School District (school district) resisted the amendment on two grounds. First, it claimed the substitute teachers sought to be included in the bargaining unit were precluded from coverage under the Act by section 20.4(5) which excludes "[t]emporary public employees employed for a period of four months or less." Second, the school district claimed that including substitute teachers in the bargaining unit already composed of regular teachers and professional employees would be inappropriate.

After an evidentiary hearing, an agency hearing officer interpreted section 20.4(5) to mean that substitute teachers performing some service in each of four consecutive months are public employees covered by the Act. PERB affirmed this ruling, consistent with its decision in Iowa Association of School Boards and Iowa State Education Association, No. 2703 (PERB Feb. 18, 1985). Then pending judicial review in Polk County district court, the decision was ultimately affirmed by this court in Iowa Association of School Boards v. PERB, 400 N.W.2d 571 (Iowa 1987). PERB also affirmed the hearing officer's conclusion that substitute teachers would be appropriately included in the existing bargaining unit.

In the meantime, both DEA and the school district petitioned for judicial review of the PERB decision. See Iowa Code § 17A.19(1) (1987). DEA challenged PERB's insistence on a four-month consecutive service qualification under the Act. The school district persisted in its claim that substitute teachers were ineligible for inclusion in any bargaining unit under the Act and, alternatively, that the proposed amendment to the existing bargaining unit would be inappropriate.

The district court consolidated the petitions for judicial review. Without having the benefit of our Iowa Association of School Boards opinion, the court concluded that PERB had misinterpreted the exclusionary language of section 20.4(5). Accordingly, the district court dismissed DEA's petition to amend the bargaining unit. It did not reach the question whether substitutes must annually requalify for inclusion in the bargaining unit, or the question of whether the proposed bargaining unit was appropriate. We now reverse the district court and address the unresolved issues.

I. In Iowa Association of School Boards v. PERB, we directly addressed the question whether substitute teachers are covered under Iowa's Public Employment Relations Act. 400 N.W.2d at 574. To find the answer, we looked for legislative meaning underlying the section 20.4(5) exclusion of "[t]emporary public employees employed for a period of four months or less." We drew two conclusions. First we determined that the use of the word "period" connoted consecutive months of employment. Id. at 575. Next we considered the legislature's use of the word "temporary". Applying the ordinary meaning of the term, we affirmed PERB's conclusion that the legislature's failure to distinguish between full-time and part-time employment meant that any service rendered in each of four consecutive months triggers the Act's provisions for a temporary employee. Id. at 576.

Notwithstanding this very recent pronouncement on the issue, both the DEA and the school district urge us to reconsider our interpretation of section 20.4(5). The DEA urges us to abandon the consecutive month requirement. The school district urges us to uphold the district court's interpretation of the statute which would require a substitute teacher to serve each and every school day for a period of more than four consecutive months to obtain the benefits accorded to a public employee under the Act.

Although the parties' arguments, pro and con, are not without merit, we fully addressed them in the Iowa Association of School Boards case and are not disposed to revisit them here. Substitute teachers who perform service for the school district in each of four consecutive months are, under our interpretation of section 20.4(5), entitled to the benefits of collective bargaining. There remains, however, the "requalification" issue raised by the school district before PERB and renewed on appeal which merits our attention.

The question is whether a substitute teacher, once qualified for inclusion in the bargaining unit by four months consecutive service, must "requalify" in each succeeding school year in order to qualify for bargaining unit inclusion. The school district argued that in contrast to regular classroom teachers who have individual contracts commencing with the first day of the school year, substitutes who qualify by teaching in more than four consecutive months of any school year are necessarily unknown at the beginning of the school year. They may remain so until sometime after collective bargaining has ensued. Without annual requalification, the district claims that membership in the bargaining unit cannot be accurately predicted, thus precluding accurate cost projections of a negotiated contract.

The DEA resists such a proposal as unworkable given the fact that contract negotiations ordinarily commence in October and conclude by March 15. See Iowa Code § 20.17(10). PERB resolved this controversy consistent with its decision in Iowa Association of School Boards, concluding that public employees who work in more than four consecutive months have a reasonable expectation of continued employment and are thereafter covered by the Act. Having met this standard, PERB contends, an employee is not obliged by section 20.4(5) to work in consecutive months "ad infinitum." Annual requalification would allow employers, absent legitimate business reasons, to schedule employees in such a way as to deny protection of the Act, notwithstanding the fact that such schedule manipulation may constitute a prohibited practice under sections 20.10(2)(a) and (d). These statutes prohibit a public employer from interfering with the exercise of an employee's right to be represented in collective bargaining by an employee organization. ¹

Having considered the arguments presented, we are not persuaded that either the district's insistence on yearly requalification or PERB's "once a public employee, always a public employee" approach satisfactorily meets the "reasonable expectation of continued employment" standard unique to the employment of substitute teachers. In an earlier case in which we analyzed the status of substitutes for purposes of unemployment benefits, we observed:

Despite the indefiniteness of teaching assignments under a substitute teaching agreement, the agreement does span the entire school year. Consequently, the contract of hire is not fulfilled when each assignment is completed. Also, the employment relationship remains intact if the substitute teacher is offered the same job for the following year.... Additionally, a substitute teacher has a continued employment relationship with the school district if he [or she] is offered similar employment for the following term.

Des Moines Indep. Community School Dist. v. Department of Job Serv., 376 N.W.2d 605, 610 (Iowa 1985).

The facts in the case before us reveal that it is customary each spring for the district to notify substitutes of the potential for employment in the coming year and to seek a response from them regarding their availability and willingness to be called. Given a substitute who has qualified for bargaining unit inclusion under the four consecutive month test of section 20.4(5), and given the district's offer of employment the following school year, we think there is clearly a reasonable expectation of continued employment justifying that employee's ongoing inclusion in the bargaining unit without further requalification. If during the ensuing school year the employee refuses opportunities to substitute, or the school district either finds the substitute's performance unsatisfactory or has no need of the substitute's work, then we presume the substitute would not be invited to consider further opportunities for employment and the reasonable expectation standard would no longer apply. Thus one full year's lapse in meeting the section 20.4(5) standard would necessitate requalification. But a substitute who qualifies in one school year will be presumed to qualify at the commencement of the succeeding year for purposes of contract negotiation, and will thereafter qualify so long as service in four consecutive months in each school year is maintained.

II. Having concluded that substitute teachers may be entitled to collective bargaining rights under the Public Employment...