Musto v. Transp. Workers Union of America

• Decision Date: 25 August 2011
• Docket Number: Civil Action No. 03–CV–2325(RJD)(ALC).
• Citation: 818 F.Supp.2d 621
• Parties: Giulio MUSTO, Aurea Avila, Donna Bates, Ana Garcia, Joseph E. Duncan, Herbert Carrillo, Agnes Dallas, Dave Denny, Alfonso Ferguson, Angela Taylor Headley, Cameron King, Colin Mayers, Federico Paul, Irwin Roberts, Jose Rodriguez, Renford Scott and Claudine Smith, Plaintiffs, v. TRANSPORT WORKERS UNION OF AMERICA, AFL–CIO, Local 501 Transport Workers Union of America, AFL–CIO and American Airlines, Inc., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of New York

818 F.Supp.2d 621

Giulio MUSTO, Aurea Avila, Donna Bates, Ana Garcia, Joseph E. Duncan, Herbert Carrillo, Agnes Dallas, Dave Denny, Alfonso Ferguson, Angela Taylor Headley, Cameron King, Colin Mayers, Federico Paul, Irwin Roberts, Jose Rodriguez, Renford Scott and Claudine Smith, Plaintiffs,

v.TRANSPORT WORKERS UNION OF AMERICA, AFL–CIO, Local 501 Transport Workers Union of America, AFL–CIO and American Airlines, Inc., Defendants.

Civil Action No. 03–CV–2325(RJD)(ALC).

United States District Court, E.D. New York.

Aug. 25, 2011.

Robert S. Nayberg, Law Offices of Martin H. Scher, David J. Grech, The Scher Law Firm, LLP, Carle Place, NY, for Plaintiffs.

Joseph J. Vitale, Cohen, Weiss and Simon LLP, Corey Scott Stark, H.P. Sean Dweck, The Dweck Law Firm LLP, David M. Glanstein, O'Donnel, Schwartz, Glanstein & Rosen, L.L.P., New York, NY, Harry A. Rissetto, Jonathan C. Fritts, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP, Washington, DC, for Defendants.

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

DEARIE, District Judge:

Plaintiffs, a group of former employees of American Airlines who were laid off in 2002, bring this hybrid suit against defendants Transport Workers Union of America AFL–CIO (“TWU”), Local 501 Transport Workers Union of America (“Local 501”) and American Airlines, Inc. (“American”). Plaintiffs allege violation of the Railway Labor Act, 45 U.S.C. § 151 et seq., against TWU and Local 501 for breach of their duty of fair representation, and against American for breach of the Collective Bargaining Agreement (“CBA”). The parties filed cross-motions for summary judgment. For the reasons stated below, plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment is denied and defendants' motion for summary judgment is granted.

I. Background.A. The Parties.

Plaintiffs are former employees of American who worked at either John F. Kennedy International Airport (“JFK”) or LaGuardia Airport (“LaGuardia”) between 1995 and 2002. In 1995, plaintiffs were all classified as Title II Utility Men. Title II refers to the Collective Bargaining Agreement (“CBA”) which covered plaintiffs.¹ Utility Men refers to plaintiffs' job function, which included cleaning buildings.

The Title II CBA was one of several CBAs that covered American employees, with each CBA covering a different subset of employees based on their Title Group. Another CBA (and the only other CBA relevant to this matter) was the Title III CBA, which covered American employees who were classified as Fleet Service Clerks or Junior Fleet Service Clerks. (R.7 at 22 (1995 Title III CBA); R.10 at 37 (2001 Title III CBA).) The Title III CBA was identical in all material respects to the Title II CBA. However, whether an employee was classified as a Title II employee or a Title III employee had significant implications relating to seniority. Seniority was determined by the employee's Occupational Group Title, and seniority accrued from the date of first assignment within the particular Title Group, regardless of the particular classification within that Group. (R.8 at 548 (1995 Title II CBA); R.9 at 44 (2001 Title II CBA).)

Defendant TWU serves as the collective bargaining representative of employees of American at numerous airports and in several classifications. Defendant Local 501 is TWU's local union representative at six airports (including JFK and LaGuardia) for three Title Groups (including Title II and Title III).

B. Elimination of Plaintiffs' Classification.

During the negotiations for the Title II CBA that was finalized in August of 1995, American and TWU agreed to contract out the work of cleaning buildings. (R.8 at 667 (8/15/95 Letter Agreement).) Up to that point the work had been performed by Utility Men, so American and TWU also agreed to eliminate the Utility Man position. ( Id.) The agreement included protections for the Utility Men. The 1995 Letter Agreement memorializing the plan (“1995 LOA”) stated that the Utility Men would be moved to either the Title II Plant Maintenance Man classification or the Title III Fleet Service Clerk (“FSC”) classification, and that they would be “protected” in whichever classification they were moved to. ( Id.) A subsequent letter from Mark Burdette, the Managing Director of Employment Relations at American, noted that former Utility Men would be “protected in the first classification in which they go.” (R.18 (emphasis added).) The 1995 LOA also stated that “no employee [would] be forced to relocate to another station.” (R.8 at 667.) Burdette later clarified this provision, stating that the commitment not to force Building Cleaners to relocate “does not extend to relocation as a result of displacement by a more senior employee, nor to schedule related reductions which may be required.” (R.9 at AA0580 (1/19/96 Letter).) For various reasons discussed below, the plans to move plaintiffs into both the Plant Maintenance Man classification and the FSC classification proved to be problematic.

The plan to move Utility Men into the Plant Maintenance Man classification was problematic for a simple reason—it was not possible to accommodate most of the Utility Men in the Plant Maintenance Man classification. The Plant Maintenance Man classification involved, inter alia, “work of a semi-skilled to skilled nature as a helper or assistant to an Automotive Mechanic or Facility Maintenance Mechanic,” and “assist[ing] in storage, removal, and clean-up of hazardous waste.” (R.8 at 608). This work required additional training that many of the Utility Men (including plaintiffs) did not have. Plaintiffs are all former Utility Men who admittedly did not qualify to be placed in the Title II Plant Maintenance Man classification.

The plan to move Utility Men to the FSC classification faced a different problem caused by the duel-track seniority system at American: it would have required transitioning Title II workers to a Title III classification. As stated above, employee seniority was determined from the date of first assignment within a particular Title Group. Because Utility Men had accumulated seniority as Title II employees, a transition to the Title III FSC classification would have caused them to lose all of the seniority that they had accumulated as employees of American Airlines.² Recognizing the seniority problem, American and TWU agreed that no former Utility Men would be forced to transfer into the FSC classification. (R.14; R.18.)

Not surprisingly, the seniority problem did not go away. Issues concerning seniority are frequently the most important issues that arise in CBA negotiations. Franks v. Bowman Transportation Co., 424 U.S. 747, 766, 96 S.Ct. 1251, 47 L.Ed.2d 444 (1976) (“More than any other provision of the collective-bargaining agreement seniority affects the economic security of the individual employee covered by its terms.”); In re Royal Composing Room, Inc., 848 F.2d 345, 356 (2d Cir.1988) (Feinberg, C.J., dissenting) (“[Seniority] has become one of the cornerstones of American unionism. Seniority is the most important, and often the only, equity workers have in their company. It is one of the chief protections a worker has from management's vagaries, and it preserves the self-esteem and financial security of workers who have devoted their lives to building a company.”). The failure of American and TWU to fix the seniority problem doomed the agreement from its inception.

At oral argument, counsel for TWU attempted to explain how the parties, who were all sophisticated actors with experience in labor negotiations, could have ever thought that this agreement would be a viable solution. He stated:

In the summer of 1995, the TWU and American Airlines were not just simply focusing on what are we going to do with the building cleaners at JFK and LaGuardia and can American outsource that work to non-employees and what are we going to do with the people who used to clean the buildings.

They are dealing with an entire contract, dealing with lots of employees in different classifications, in different titles ....

I think as a practical matter the answer to your question is, the parties have so much on their plate, they were trying to reach so many big issues, that on this one they said well, we think this would work as the solution. They threw it down as the August 15th letter of agreement and then quickly realized after they went home, took a shower and had a night's sleep, that it wasn't going to work as cleanly as they cobbled together at the negotiating table and then embarked on the process that eventually led us here.

(7/14/11 Tr. at 11.) Plaintiffs do not contest this description of the events that led to the 1995 LOA. In short, both sides agree that the parties reached an agreement in 1995 that was doomed to fail because it did not resolve the key issue of seniority.

When American and TWU recognized that the plan to move former Utility Men to Title III Fleet Service was unworkable, they devised an alternative plan; they agreed to move the former Utility Men into the recently-created Title II classification of “Cabin Cleaner.” ³ The 1995 Title II CBA described the scope of work for the Cabin Cleaner classification as “those functions required for the provisioning and cleaning associated with dedicated overnight (e.g.—Level 1 and fleet work) and International cabin cleaning (e.g. BXT bill of work).” ⁴ (R.8 at 609.) Thus, by definition, Cabin Cleaner work overlapped considerably with Fleet Service work.

C. 1996 Arbitration Award.

Although the plan to move the former Utility Men to the Cabin Cleaner classification was intended to avoid the problems discussed above, it was not without its own problems. The first issue that arose following the reassignment dealt with the pay scale for former Utility Workers who were now classified as Cabin Cleaners. Because the base pay for Utility Men exceeded the top rate of pay for Cabin Cleaners, American took the position that the former Utility Workers were entitled to maintain their current hourly pay rate, but that they were...