STATE OFFICERS AND EMPLOYEES; RETIREMENT AND PENSION SYSTEMS; COLLECTIVE BARGAINING;

PUBLIC EMPLOYEES - STATE; COLLECTIVE BARGAINING;

Connecticut laws/regulations;

You asked for a comparison of Connecticut’s state employee collective bargaining laws, including how they approach retirement benefits, with those of Massachusetts, New York, and Rhode Island.

SUMMARY

There are considerable similarities between Connecticut’s state employee collective bargaining statute and those of Massachusetts, New York, and Rhode Island. They all (1) allow employees to form unions and collectively bargain over wages, hours, and conditions of employment; (2) specify prohibited practices most of which center around protecting an employee’s freedom to participate in union activities; and (3) require both employee organizations and employers to bargain in good faith. One major difference is Connecticut is the only state that explicitly allows collective bargaining for retirement benefits and related issues. Only Massachusetts does not allow collective bargaining over health insurance benefits.

Connecticut has the broadest binding interest arbitration law of the four states, with all issues, including wages, and all unions eligible for binding arbitration. But it also gives the legislature the ability to reject an award by a two-thirds vote if it determines the state has insufficient funds to carry out the award.

BACKGROUND

The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), also known as the Wagner Act, gives collective bargaining rights to private sector employees. (It exempts certain private employees, including managers and supervisors, agricultural workers, and independent contractors. ) Public employees also are exempt from the NLRA. The act left it to the states to decide whether to pass public employee collective bargaining laws. According to a U. S. General Accounting Office report issued in 2002:

• 26 states and the District of Columbia have collective bargaining for most public employees,

• 12 have bargaining for some public employees, and

• 12 do not have any collective bargaining for public employees.

Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, and Rhode Island all have public employee collective bargaining laws that are similar to the NLRA.

RETIREMENT BENEFITS

Connecticut statutes make state employee retirement benefits and the retirement system subject to collective bargaining and specify that negotiations regarding retirement issues will be conducted between the state and State Employees Bargaining Agent Coalition (SEBAC). SEBAC is identified in statute as “a coalition committee which represents all state employees who are members of any designated employee organization” (CGS § 5-278(f)).

Massachusetts, New York, and Rhode Island law explicitly prohibits state employee retirement benefits from collective bargaining (see Table 1 below for a collective bargaining comparison by state). But these prohibitions are sometimes circumvented. In 2000, New York unions negotiated changes to the retirement system so that Tier III and Tier IV employees are exempt from making contributions to the retirement system once they contribute for 10 years (employees of the other two tiers of the retirement system never were required to make contributions). The deal was reached through negotiations, then legislation was enacted to change the law accordingly.

“At the time the pension fund was flush and the unions convinced the governor that after 10 years the employees no longer had to contribute,” explained Steven Koczak, a researcher at the New York Senate Research Service. Although such changes to the retirement system are relatively

rare, Koczak said they are made from time to time through negotiations even though such negotiations are banned. “They get around it by adding the language to a bill in the legislature,” Koczak said.

On the other hand, in Connecticut there are occasions when something that is required to be done through collective bargaining is handled through legislation. This was case earlier this year when PA 03-2 created the new state employee Early Retirement Incentive Program. SEBAC has indicated it will file a grievance over the state’s failure to negotiate this.

Table 1. Comparison of Collective Bargaining Statutes for State Employees

OTHER ITEMS EXCLUDED FROM COLLECTIVE BARGAINING

Massachusetts is the only state that specifically excludes health insurance benefits from collective bargaining. Connecticut and New York both specifically exclude the civil service (merit) system including testing, scoring, and hiring from scoring lists. In New York, the civil service law, which is separate from the public employee collective bargaining law (known as the Taylor Act), contains the pay schedule for civil service employees. Koczak said it is common practice that when a wage increase is agreed to through bargaining, the accompanying legislation amends the civil service law to reflect the increase.

BARGAINING AGREEMENTS CONFLICTING WITH STATUTES

Connecticut law explicitly states that where a collective bargaining agreement (or an arbitrator’s decision) conflicts with a statute, the agreement (or decision) prevails as long as the issue is something appropriate to collective bargaining. Massachusetts’s collective bargaining law specifically cites 24 sections of various statutes that may be superseded by a collective bargaining agreement. These include: (1) rules for vacation, sick leave, and overtime; (2) pay plan funding; and (3) employee grievances regarding conditions of employment. In New York when a bargaining agreement is reached, it is used as the basis for legislation to make the statutes consistent with the new agreement.

INTEREST ARBITRATION

Binding Decisions

Each of the four states provides for interest arbitration when contract negotiations reach an impasse. Although each state provides for binding interest arbitration, they each handle it differently, as shown in Table 2.

Connecticut and Massachusetts both have binding interest arbitration, but both provide certain limitations. In Connecticut, the legislature may reject an arbitration decision if a two-thirds vote of either house determines there are “insufficient funds for full implementation of the award” (CGS § 5-278(b)). Voting down an arbitration award is relatively rare, although it happened a number of times in the mid 1990’s. The last time the legislature rejected an arbitration award was in 1997 when the Senate rejected one regarding the correction officers union. (Also, a court can vacate or modify an award if it finds one party is prejudiced because the award (1) violates Constitutional rights, (2) is beyond the arbitrator’s statutory authority, (3) is based on a flawed procedure or other error of law, or (4) is clearly erroneous in light of the reliable, probative, and substantial evidence of the record. )

In Massachusetts, both parties of an impasse must agree to go to binding arbitration, and then they are bound by the decision.

In New York, only state police, correctional officers, and other public safety unions have binding arbitration that binds the state by the arbitrator’s decision. The other state employee unions usually get the benefits of binding arbitration, Koczak said, because the decision often sets a precedent that the unions without binding arbitration pursue, and usually win, in negotiations. He said this is known as “pattern negotiation. ”

In Rhode Island, the state is bound by arbitration decisions that follow an impasse, but wages are statutorily exempted from binding arbitration.

Decision Methods

Connecticut differs from the other three states in its arbitration method. The statute requires that an arbitrator choose between the last best offers of the two negotiating parties. This means the arbitrator must choose either management’s last offer or the union’s last offer. The choice is made for each issue in arbitration (Some states require “last best offer” on a whole package basis). The other three states have conventional interest arbitration where the arbitrator has complete discretion to choose one of the offers, anything in between, or even something beyond the range of the offers.

Dan Livingston, the chief negotiator for SEBAC, said last best offer arbitration is intended, in part, to bring the parties closer together because the farther apart they are going into arbitration, the more they have to risk as the arbitrator may choose the other side.

Last best offer is also considered a guard against capricious arbitration decisions.

On the other hand, last best offer limits the arbitrator’s choices including his ability to split the difference between the two sides on issues of wages and benefits.

Both methods are used around the country, according to 1996 National Public Employer Labor Relations Association (NPELRA) article. There are also hybrid forms of arbitration where some issues are last best offer arbitration and some are conventional interest arbitration. According to NPELRA there are at least 20 different approaches to interest arbitration.

Table 2. Comparison of Interest Arbitration Statutes for State Employees

JM: eh