By Daina Klimanis
The York Dispatch
Copyright 2007 York Newspapers, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
YORK, Pa. — York City filed a suit against its firefighters union earlier this week, seeking to overturn an arbitrator’s decision that could increase what the city pays for retiree health care.
Until this year, once a retired member of the York Professional Firefighters Association became eligible for Medicare, the city capped what it would pay for his major medical expenses at $5,000 in a lifetime.
But an arbitration award issued in January said the city should be required to pay up to $5,000 a year instead.
The award also ordered the city to adjust retiree benefits retroactively. The suit, filed in the York County Court of Common Pleas, argues that the retroactive adjustment is against the state constitution, and says the arbitrator should not even have been able to rule on retiree benefits under a previous agreement between the city and the union.
City Mayor John Brenner said his administration is just doing what it can to save tax dollars.
“This is not about one specific labor union and their issues,” Brenner said. “This is about protecting the taxpayers.”
But union president David Bowman said the city is wasting tax dollars instead by pursuing a lawsuit that will not succeed.
“They’re more intent in litigating things than they are in talking,” Bowman said. “It’s just status quo for the administration.”
Bowman said he expects the city’s suit to fail because binding arbitration is binding.
But Michael McAuliffe Miller, an attorney with Wolf Block LLP in Harrisburg who is representing the city, said the circumstances called for an appeal of the arbitrator’s decision, a move he said is not unusual.
“The arbitrator’s decision, we feel, was incorrect, and it changes the policy that the city has followed for 15 years or so,” Miller said. “And therefore it’s the city’s belief it has
an obligation to try to protect that status quo.”
Numerous clashes: Another round of arbitration hearings is set to begin soon, this time over whether the city and firefighters union have a valid contract in place.
Concerns over firefighter staffing levels led the union to withdraw its support for contract provisions that union members had already voted to approve. Over union protests, the city administration said the contract terms were valid, and a majority of the city council voted to approve the contract earlier this year.
An arbitration hearing had been scheduled to happen earlier this week, but was postponed at the request of the city, Bowman said.
Conflicts between the city and its unions have been ongoing. The city and its police union ended up in binding arbitration after they could not agree on contract terms at the end of last year.
Other disputes have wound up in court; among them was a case in which York County Court of Common Pleas judge said the city had to pay the medical bills of a police detective injured when he crashed his car while driving drunk. The city has appealed the case to Commonwealth Court.