March 2016

Name

Subject Matter

Date Issued

Case Number

Topic(s)

Unfair Labor Practice Not Found: Respondent Did Not Violate Duty to Bargain When it Implemented its Last Best Offer after Contract Expiration because Parties were at Impasse Prior to Implementation of Last Best Offer; Respondent did not Violate its Duty to Bargain in Good Faith by Refusing to Recognize Temporary Employees as Part of Charging Party’s Bargaining Unit Because Evidence was Insufficient to Establish that Respondent Mislabeled Employees Whose Tenure was Indefinite as “Temporary” in order to Exclude Them from the Unit.

Unfair Labor Practice Not Found:  Charging Party Failed to Set Forth Any Policy Reason to Refuse to Recognize the Mootness of the Charge as the Law is Well Settled with Regard to a Public Employer’s Duty to Bargain in Good Faith Over Decisions to Reduce Employee Work Hours; Parties Entered into MOU Resolving Issues Relating to Implementation of Furlough Days, Therefore There was No Longer a Live Controversy, and Case was Moot;  Mootness Precludes Adjudication of Claim Where the Actual Controversy No Longer Exists. 

3/16/2016

C12 F-116

(20 Day Order)

Unfair Labor Practice Not Found:  Charging Party Failed to File Timely Charge Within Six Months Of Respondent’s Rejection of Her Resignation; The Fact That Charging Party May Not Have Realized That She Had Suffered An Invasion of Her Legal Rights or Hot to go About Enforcing Them Did Not Toll the Statute; Commission Has Strict Six Month Statute of Limitations and is Precluded From Finding a PERA Violation Because the Charge was Untimely. 

3/16/2016

CU15 J-034

(20 Day Order)

Mid-Michigan Community College -and- Mid-Michigan Community College Faculty Senate, Inc., MEA/NEA

Unfair Labor Practice Found:  Respondent Violated § 10(1)(e) by Unilaterally Removing Positions From Bargaining Unit Represented by Charging Party;  Respondent Has Obligation to Bargain with Charging Party Over Terms and Conditions of Employment;  Removing Some of the Positions’ Duties Does Not Destroy Community of Interest with Bargaining Unit Such That Respondent was Permitted to Remove Positions from Bargaining Unit;  Charging Party Not Required to Demand to Bargain over Removal of Bargaining Unit Positions Because Respondent Unilaterally Removed the Positions Without Meaningful Changes in Job Duties; Unit Clarification Case Dismissed as Moot Because Positions Should Not Have Been Unilaterally Removed from Bargaining Unit.  

3/3/2016

C14 G-075 & UC14 G-011   

(20 Day Order)

Duty to Bargain; Repudiation; Unilateral Change; Demand to Bargain; Unit Clarification

Petition for Unit Clarification Granted: Commission Granted AFSCME’s Petition to Clarify Its Unit by Adding the Plant Technician and Office Support Specialist Positions; When a Position Is Genuinely New and Claimed by More Than One Existing Bargaining Unit, the Commission Defers to Employer’s Good Faith Decision, as Long as it is Reasonable and Disputed Position Shares Community of Interest with the Unit in which it is Placed; These Positions Are Not New Positions As the Reclassification Did Not Result in a Substantial Change in the Job Duties Performed by Either Position.  However, Employer was Directed by United States District Court Order to Review and Reduce the Number of its Existing Classifications to Increase Workforce Flexibility.  Consequently, the Employer Abolished All of Its Existing Positions and Created New Ones, Therefore, the Positions Must Be Analyzed as New Positions.  Since Plant Technician and Office Support Specialist Positions Were Treated as New, There was No Bargaining History to Consider, and the Commission Was Guided by the Primary Objective of Constituting the Largest Unit Containing Positions Having a Community of Interest.  Thus, It Was Not Reasonable to Create a Unit Including Only Those Two Positions.  The Commission Found that the Appropriate Unit was the Existing Larger Unit of Employees with Which the Two Positions Shared a Community of Interest; That Was the Unit Represented by AFSCME.