Fitchburg Teachers Ass'n v. School Committee of Fitchburg

• Decision Date: 30 June 1971
• Citation: 360 Mass. 105,271 N.E.2d 646
• Parties: , 77 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 3132, 66 Lab.Cas. P 52,608 FITCHBURG TEACHERS ASSOCIATION v. SCHOOL COMMITTEE OF FITCHBURG et al.
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

Page 646

271 N.E.2d 646

360 Mass. 105, 77 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 3132,

66 Lab.Cas. P 52,608

FITCHBURG TEACHERS ASSOCIATION v. SCHOOL COMMITTEE OF FITCHBURG et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Worcester.

Argued May 7, 1971.

Decided June 30, 1971.

Jeffrey M. Freedman, Boston, for plaintiff.

Philip Salny, City Sol., for defendants, submitted a brief.

Before TAURO, C.J., and CUTTER, REARDON, QUIRICO and BRAUCHER, JJ.

REARDON, Justice.

This is a bill for declaratory relief under G.L. c. 231A, in which the plaintiff, Fitchburg Teachers Association (the association), seeks payment to certain teachers of salary adjustments to which they are entitled under an amendment effective January 1, 1969, to a collective bargaining contract then in existence between the association and the defendant school committee of Fitchburg (the committee).

The case was tried in the Superior Court on a statement of agreed facts which is summarized below. On November 7, 1966, pursuant to G.L. c. 149, § 178I, the committee and the association entered into a three year contract effective July 1, 1966, subject to annual reopening on matters of 'Compensation and other Conditions of Employment.' In October, 1968, the association properly reopened the contract, and the committee subsequently voted to approve several of the amendments proposed by the association. One of these was the provision here in issue, which stipulates a 'salary adjustment for a teacher's final year of service before retirement' based on the number of days over 170 he has attended in each year of his service. On December 4, 1968, the committee notified the defendant auditor of the city of Fitchburg that it had approved this and other amendments and that they were effective as of January 1, 1969. In June of that year the committee submitted to the auditor an order for payment of sums due under the amendment to eligible teachers retiring in 1969, but the auditor refused to approve such payment on the ground that it would be improper.

On these facts the trial judge ruled that the amendment to the contract was 'valid and proper' but nevertheless dismissed the bill on the ground that 'the City of Fitchburg never appropriated in the 1968 or 1969 budget any money for the purpose of paying the amounts due or that might become due under the provisions of the amendment to the contract.'

1. Assuming a sufficiency of funds available to the school committee, there was no error in the ruling that the amendment was valid. The power of school committees to 'contract with the teachers of the public schools' and to engage in collective bargaining for the purpose of setting 'wages, hours and other conditions of employment' is fixed by statute. G.L. c. 71, § 38, as amended through St.1965, c. 164. G.L. c. 149, § 178I, as amended through St.1969, c. 341. The complete and exclusive nature of the authority to contract has been long established in our case law. Watt v. Chelmsford, 323 Mass. 697, 700, 84 N.E.2d 28, and cases cited. Attorney Gen. v. Ware, 328 Mass. 18, 20, 101 N.E.2d 365. Lynch v. Fall River, 336 Mass. 558, 559, 147 N.E.2d 152. Collins v. Boston, 338 Mass. 704, 707, 157 N.E.2d 339. This amendment, part of the over-all package of services and benefits worked out by the parties pursuant to collective bargaining and embodied in the contract, was a valid exercise by the committee of its power to set wages. We need not decide whether the fact that the salary adjustment is based in part on services performed before the effective date of the amendment makes it lacking in consideration when viewed in isolation, for it should properly be considered only as part of the entire quid pro quo of the contract. Even considered alone, it bears considerable resemblance to the provision for a 'bonus' to school employees which we sustained in Attorney Gen. v. Woburn, 317 Mass. 465, 467, 58 N.E.2d 746, against a charge, similar to that made by the defendants here, that it was a 'mere gratuity.' See Averell v. Newburyport, 241 Mass. 333, 135 N.E. 463 (school committee rule providing for paid sick leave valid).

The provision is in addition a reasonable one. Days in excess of 170 worked in a given year represent unused sick leave or personal leave. The provision thus has the effect of rewarding lengthy and continuing service by teachers and discouraging frivolous use of sick leave....