State v. State Troopers Fraternal Ass'n

• Decision Date: 20 December 1993
• Citation: 634 A.2d 478,134 N.J. 393
• Parties: , 145 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2564 STATE of New Jersey, Petitioner-Appellant, v. STATE TROOPERS FRATERNAL ASSOCIATION, Respondent-Respondent.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

Page 393

134 N.J. 393

634 A.2d 478, 145 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2564

STATE of New Jersey, Petitioner-Appellant, v. STATE TROOPERS FRATERNAL ASSOCIATION, Respondent-Respondent.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Argued Sept. 14, 1993.

Decided Dec. 20, 1993.

Mary L. Cupo-Cruz, Senior Deputy Atty. Gen., for petitioner-appellant (Fred DeVesa, Acting Atty. Gen. of New Jersey, attorney; Alexander P. Waugh, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., of counsel).

Michael J. Rappa, Hackensack, for respondent-respondent State Troopers Fraternal Ass'n (Loccke & Correia, attorneys).

Robert E. Anderson, Gen. Counsel, argued the cause for Public Employment Relations Com'n.

The opinion of the Court was delivered by

STEIN, J.

The issue presented by this appeal is whether the so-called "discipline amendment" to N.J.S.A. 34:13A-5.3, L. 1982, c. 103, obligates the New Jersey Division of State Police (State Police or Division) to engage in collective negotiations concerning procedures, including binding arbitration, to review disciplinary determinations affecting state troopers.

A somewhat different issue precipitated the litigation. The basic dispute between the State Troopers Fraternal Association (STFA) and the State Police was whether certain grievances were arbitrable under their existing negotiated agreement. Four state troopers had filed the grievances to challenge the legality of the State Police's use of summary disciplinary hearings to resolve disciplinary violations allegedly committed by those troopers and to determine appropriate sanctions. Contending that the conduct implicated by the alleged violations was not sufficiently serious to warrant disciplinary hearings and customarily had been regarded by the State Police as warranting only written reprimands, the troopers asserted that the use of summary disciplinary hearings to resolve the various infractions was inconsistent with the underlying agreement. The State Police Superintendent rejected the grievances on the ground that they were not authorized by the agreement. The STFA then sought to invoke the binding arbitration mechanism in the agreement to resolve the grievances. The State objected, asserting that the underlying issue was not arbitrable, and informing the designated arbitrator that the State did not intend to arbitrate.

To avoid the arbitration that the STFA had initiated, the State petitioned the Public Employment Relations Commission (PERC) for a scope-of-negotiations determination pursuant to N.J.S.A. 34:13A-5.4(d) of the New Jersey Employer-Employee Relations Act, N.J.S.A. 34:13A-1 to -29 (the Act). The question posed by the State's petition was whether discipline imposed by the Superintendent of State Police is within the scope of collective negotiations. The State contended that such negotiations were preempted by the broad grant of authority conferred on the State Police Superintendent by N.J.S.A. 53:1-10, which provides:

The superintendent shall, with the approval of the governor, make all rules and regulations for the discipline and control of the state police, and provide the necessary preliminary and subsequent instruction to the troopers in their duties as police officers.

Relying on the 1982 discipline amendment to N.J.S.A. 34:13A-5.3, PERC held that that amendment obligated the State Police to negotiate concerning procedures to review disciplinary determinations, including binding arbitration, notwithstanding the Superintendent's statutory supervisory authority over rules and regulations for discipline of the state troopers. In re State of New Jersey & State Troopers Fraternal Ass'n, 17 NJPER (Lab. Rel. Press) p 22152 (PERC June 21, 1991). PERC expressly refrained, however, from deciding whether the underlying grievances were arbitrable under the existing agreement, and if arbitrable, meritorious, emphasizing that PERC's function was to address only the abstract issue of whether the subject matter in dispute is within the scope of collective negotiations. Id. p 22152, at 341. Ironically, the underlying dispute concerning the arbitrability of the grievances under the agreement, which triggered the litigation, has never been resolved and is now moot. Three of the troopers have withdrawn their grievances and the Division has dismissed disciplinary charges against the fourth.

The Appellate Division affirmed PERC's scope-of-negotiations ruling, 260 N.J.Super. 270, 615 A.2d 1286 (1992), observing that "[t]he discipline amendment and its arbitration provisions presumptively apply to all employers and employees covered by the Act." Id. at 280, 615 A.2d 1286. Accordingly, that court concluded that PERC's interpretation of the discipline amendment "preserves the employee's right to negotiate over minor disciplinary proceedings without diluting the employer's authority under N.J.S.A. 53:1-10 to adopt rules governing employee conduct." Id. at 282, 615 A.2d 1286.

We granted the State's Petition for Certification, 133 N.J. 435, 627 A.2d 1141 (1993). Although the grievances that precipitated this litigation have been resolved, we consider and decide the issue presented by this appeal because of its public importance. See Clark v. Degnan, 83 N.J. 393, 397, 416 A.2d 816 (1980).

I

The underlying controversy between the parties will provide a context for our resolution of this appeal. The relevant labor agreement was in effect from July 1, 1987, to June 30, 1990, and Article XII of that agreement established the policy and procedures for the submission and settlement of grievances filed by state troopers. The grievance provisions of the agreement refer to the three categories of disciplinary proceedings described in the State Police Rules and Regulations:

(1) A general disciplinary hearing, which can result in reduction in rank or grade, suspension with forfeiture of pay, or removal;

(2) A summary disciplinary hearing, which can result in suspension and forfeiture of pay for up to one month; and

(3) A written reprimand, for infractions that the Superintendent determines are not sufficiently serious to warrant a disciplinary hearing, pursuant to which the offending trooper may be suspended with forfeiture of pay for up to five days.

New Jersey State Police Rules and Regulations art. I, § 1(a)-(c) (Aug. 1977) (Rules and Regulations ).

The grievance provisions of the state troopers' labor agreement specified that the grievance procedures did not apply to discipline resulting from general or summary disciplinary hearings. Although the grievance provisions did encompass discipline resulting from written reprimands, that grievance procedure was truncated in that the agreement stated that those grievances were to be submitted directly to the State Police Superintendent, and if not resolved by the Superintendent, to the Attorney General for final resolution.

The agreement distinguished between two kinds of grievances: (1) an allegation of a breach, misinterpretation, or improper application of the provisions of the agreement (a "B-1 grievance"); and (2) a claimed violation, misinterpretation, or misapplication of the rules and regulations, policy, or procedures affecting the terms and conditions of employment (a "B-2 grievance"). The agreement provided that if B-2 grievances could not be resolved pursuant to an intra-departmental grievance procedure described in the agreement, such grievances could be submitted to the Attorney General for final resolution. If B-1 grievances could not be resolved intra-departmentally, those grievances could be submitted for resolution by binding arbitration.

The troopers' grievances focused on the use of summary disciplinary hearings as the mechanism to impose discipline for infractions that the troopers characterized as "minor." Trooper John Christmann, charged with failing to carry his weapon while on duty, was suspended without pay for four days. Trooper Hiram Ortiz, Jr. was charged with disobeying a written order concerning the approved method of searching female suspects, speaking abusively to a female suspect, and failing to search a van in which he had probable cause to believe marijuana was concealed; Ortiz was suspended without pay for eight days. Trooper Michael Karsevar, charged with losing or allowing the theft of his weapon, received a four-day suspension without pay. The fourth trooper had been charged with losing a portable radio and ordered to appear at a summary disciplinary hearing, but the hearing was cancelled after the charge was dismissed.

Although the existing agreement expressly provided that the grievance procedures did not apply to discipline imposed at general or summary disciplinary hearings, the troopers filed B-1 grievances alleging that the State Police's designation of the summary disciplinary hearing procedure constituted a "circumvention" of the agreement. The troopers asserted that the disciplinary violations of which they had been accused customarily had been resolved pursuant to the written-reprimand disciplinary procedure. However, no provision of the agreement defined the type of disciplinary infractions warranting only written reprimands rather than summary or general disciplinary hearings; the State Police Rules and Regulations remit such a determination to the Superintendent's discretion. Rules and Regulations art. I, § 1(c). Nevertheless, after the grievances had been rejected by the Superintendent, the STFA sought relief through the binding arbitration procedure available under the agreement for B-1 grievances. The State then filed its scope-of-negotiations petition with PERC to restrain the arbitration and to elicit a determination about whether the Division is obligated to engage in collective negotiations concerning review procedures and arbitration of state trooper disciplinary proceedings.

Before addressing the merits, we note that the core issue of contractual arbitrability raised by the STFA's request for arbitration was far easier to resolve than the question presented by the...