subpoena concerns the issue of whether the respondent illinois educational labor relations board properly certified the respondent union as the exclusive bargaining representative of the mixed unit of tenured in non tenured faculty at the university of chicago campus the first issue for your consideration is whether the respondent board properly interpreted the last paragraph of section seventy of the illinois occasional labor relations act as permitting the inclusion of non tenured faculty in the sole appropriate unit for tenured faculty the courtship lighty no standard of review for this particular issue in light of the fact that it is predominantly one of statutory interpretation the board's interpretation is over no deference for two reasons number one this is a matter of first impression for the educational labor relations this is not a situation where the court has had a long history in practice of interred in this particular section statute his language is clear and unambiguous the second issue for consideration is whether the educational labor relations board properly certified a tenured non tenured faculty in as appropriate under a traditional community of interest this analysis this court should apply it clearly erroneous standard or view to that question because it is an issue a mix issue of fact and law university maintains however that this court does not even need to reach this second issue unless it first agrees with work sops the board's interpretation of the last paragraph of section seven a university maintains that the board did not correctly interpret that last paragraph section seven eight that section seventy prohibits the mixture of non tenured with tenured faculty in the same year in analyzing the meaning of the last paragraph of section seven eight zero three critical phrases or terms that should be considered the first term it should be considered is the subject of the centers of the first sentence several appropriate you know the second important phrase or term that needs to be considered is the connecting term includes which obviously the parties have their major disagreement about the third phrase or term the ease to be taken into consideration is the phrase ten and tenure track that phrase appears both before determining looms if it fails after the term includes is the university's position that when these three phrases are read in cont the legislature's clear intent was that he said will read only unit sold mean only according to the plain dictionary term the solar only unit for tenure track or tenure system faculty is one that is limited to that only includes tenure system back to the board's interpretation is based on an expansive meaning of the term includes according to the board the term includes typically introduces a list or a subset of items that belong to a more generalized subject matter for several reasons this interpretation makes no sense in the context of the last paragraph of section seventy first and foremost when you read that first sentence of section seven eight there is no list there is no i didn't ization it follows the term includes the only thing that follows the term includes is the phrase tenure in tenure track that very same phrase appears to be for the term includes as well in describing what the sole appropriate unit is the structure of section seven eight doesn't lend itself to interpret it as providing a description to the reader of the types of things that should be wrong to the sole appropriate unit the  interpretation what it made more sense for example there was an itemized list following the term includes for example yes the term includes includes for example non tenured faculty paraprofessionals maiden's clerical then the board's interpretation might make more sense alternatively the board's interpretation may have made more sense if the subject of the s wasn't so limited in discrete in other words rather than saying the sole appropriate unit here is for creation would have made more sense if it had started out by same propre more generalize university would submit that he orders in the union's interpretation also doesn't make any sense when one considers the unionist interpretation that includes has such an expansive meaning that the to the record and the reason why that doesn't make any sense of the following if any particular employee clerical maintenance non tenured could actually belong to the sole appropriate unit the university submits that basically nullifies and reads the word soul appropriate so the appropriate unit out of the statute why then would the general assembly have gone to the trouble of retaining that phrase when they went about amending section seven a the easiest way if they wanted anybody in every employee group to belong to that unit would have been just a delete all section that last seven the case law that the board cites fault in its decision and its brief in support of this expansive interpretation of the word includes university submit is distinguishable the cases that the board interpretation in the right context university submits that this is just that right happens the university would also submit that there is another defect in the board's interpretation of the last paragraph of section seventy assuming for the sake of argument that the word includes does have an expansive mean that all wattles or permits other types of the key terms were in existence both in the prior version as well as the else two thousand and three her sole appropriate unit and includes one would assume then that if the board interpretation is right the preacher two thousand production should have also had an expansive meaning meaning that non tenured may or may not have been included reporter would not have been included in other employer groups were permitted to be included or not permitted to be included yet both the board restrictive mean university would submit they can't have it both ways either to pretty two thousand and three in the post two thousand and three both heavy restrictive meaning where the pretty two thousand and three imposed two thousand people have an expansive mean you can't have one and the other bargaining units to just tenure system tackle the legislative history nevertheless dispels anybody any doubt regarding the sections proper me significantly when you read it and you analyze how the general assembly went they started modifying the language he did determine non tenure from the prior version of section seventy this is significant for the following reason assuming again the board's interpretation is correct assuming again that includes has an ex fance of meaning such that it could allow certain groups like non tenured to be included in the sole appropriate unit or picks it includes has that expansive meaning why then with the general assembly have gone to the trouble of deleting the word non tenured university would submit that if they had kept the word non tenured there would have been perfectly consistent with an expansive meaning or expansive reading of the term includes the fact that the general assembly what about deleting that phrase seems to suggest that they wanted it out of there that they wanted to not tenured and other types of employers also if the response is also when you look beyond the actual structure of how the one about amending section seconds the second reading of the bill in that second reading of the bill senator maloney very clearly men mentioned in stated the intent was to limit the sole appropriate unit to just was that there should only be one bargaining unit on each particular campus in other words there could be a clerical unit or a maintenance unit or we would submit that if you read senator maloney's comment in relation to the language oh of the amendment that was being passed it was clear that he was referencing hipaa soul appropriate for tenured tenure track pickel team would be limited to just tenured tenure track personnel the other various  legislative commons he believed support rather than defeat universities interpretation for example the union in its brief also mention several references to the word option senator  maloney mentioned several times in the third reading that battle t would have the option the option of working nights again on a campus by campus basis we submit that that repeated reference to option meant  appropriate tenured faculty for example not tenure maintenance lyrical career professionals what have you when you read it in context there is no indication that that was the legislature finally in terms of the course community of interest decision based on traditional community of interest factors again this is an issue they do not need to reach unless you find or disagree with the board with the plain language of the current reading of section seventy so first of all they should not have relied on that regulation or applied a presumption in any way younger reasons  consideration of the of the disparity in wages and the spirit he in job security between tenured and non tenured bekele in light of the potential for conflicts of interest in light of the fact that the importance that tenured faculty play these of the not tenured faculty and in light of the research mission of the u i c campus it would be the university's position that  to focus on cases in case law involving smaller community colleges school districts do not have such an important research mission as u i c does again one of the record facts indicating that last year alone they were estimated to have collected over four hundred million dollars in extra research grants comparisons or analogies to community colleges and school districts  are not worth it in this case in conclusion to respond misinterpretation of the last paragraph of section seven a reeses more questions than it answers when reading this proper context and when a particular to provision that applies only to the university of illinois that it permits this permit petition for bargaining unit of tenure tenure track and nine tenure faculty at the university of illinois chicago campus and then the board did what it normally does when it gets to seeking representation it looks at the language of the act what does the permit and it looks like the petition here the board looked at the language of the act it considered dead language was clear that includes did not was not a limiting term in this case and that the act to actually three things are going to remain together regardless and so it doesn't open up the option so why don't you know there's so many variations of what sparked this might be it's still pretty there's certain configurations you can have a ten year tenure track in one but you wouldn't be splitting those apart and that sucks i'm going to be a planner cross university and so it's you  provision you know just applying the full is freedom it also down look see at what what is required here for university of illinois which is somewhat different than what is otherwise required for other educational institution educational employees employers so it it does it's a recent trip to chasten that takes into account you know all of all of the typical to the considerations to have to be taken into account when they're looking and they are seeking representation  acts furthers the purposes of the act they're what their interest is and so if you have two separate if you have differing interpretations and you can see where one actually furthers purposes of the act it's plausible reasonable interpretation of they wanted to bring a case under they run very different strategies so that list would never apply to them anyway so neither of those cases actually help universities kate argument that you know i wanna i wanna  that the board members are not experts in their fields or their they've been appointed and that's that's the requirement for the for the appointment and and you know boards charged with with making these decisions that's the general simply set up this this structure for for it you know how these decisions are to be here i get as the board being required to use  determination under its rules on the two two  stated it offers them to the option to form back collective bargaining now we're in agreement that the collective bargaining agreement but the collective bargaining unit that was previously it's a state had both nine ten year and ten year faculty so he specifically makes reference to that next year then and specifically makes reference to giving them the option to put that in effect together so when you're looking at a legislative committee you have to look at it in the entire context of all the statements and what the university is asking you to do is to look at nearly every one statement taken out of contacts to establish or to argue that the board's consideration finding that unit was appropriate was improper we also think sat professional and not professional bodies cannot be in a mixed unit on last they both agree to be and that combined unit so the legislatures clearly knew how to put limits on this so they didn't do so here and to to adopt the universities are would be the first time in this into history where the legislature has sat you have one unit and one unit only if you don't like it too bad and that's certainly not something legislatures ever time it certainly is contrary  us we believe it's clear do you think it's morally grafted i do think that it could have been drafted better but i think you know you weren't really drafted so that it permits different interpretations isn't the same thing as being a no no i think that way when they started with the statutory language i think what they were doing was working from what they had it was six and so i think through the legislative process instead of drafting entirely new language it may have been easier easier for the legislature to cut and paste rather than to redraft the entire thing and so i think that that's where it starts way and i also see the universities makes the argument that deletion of the reference to nine ten year basically what it does is sad that tenure don't they don't need to be in the bargaining but that doesn't mean that it can't be we believe that the legislation made it easier to wor saying you don't have to have all of these employees you have to have a ten year ten track but that is taking a giant leap to say nobody else can be in the market also for the university also takes makes made a clearly we're not taking a position that maintenance boy would fit the definition of academic faculty so we are saying that individuals other than ten year nine ten year or ten attract faculty to be included but they still have to fit with  interpretation and nothing has changed from ninety five to the president that would support the university's position that they're no longer is be of interest in this case when you look at it there are really few discernible differences between non ten to the university doesn't dispute that they teach the same classes they have the same education same supervision same hours they have the same due process rights they have the same promotion and evaluation process so the universities argument community of interest is based on this esoteric argument that there's an inherent conflict of interest on that really isn't very identifiable or hasn't been well identified by the university one of the arguments that they make is  non tenure track faculty support tenure track and that somehow distracts from or detracts from a finding of community adventurous if you look at it and there's plenty of pieces on it when one job title supports another that's a factor in support of a finding of interest because it shows functional integration in addition they argue that there's no community of interest or there's a conflict of interest because non tenure  feet university also has taken issue with the fact that the board didn't give proper consideration to other public universities and illinois there are but none of those cases where there was there  fact in all of the cases considered by this court and by the four were ten your status was raised the board in the courts have found the tenure status is not determinative the employer is also argued about the desires from the employees in the petition for you so that clearly has been found or didn't raise it at the l j level and has waived any argument on that issue i'm the other thing that i want to jump back to very quickly your honour's is the university when interpreting section seven they're asking you to read the work only into that legislation they want you to read and it's only ten years and if you have interpretation is reasonable it's correct or incorrect number two there was some suggestion by the union this is the first time in our that our interpretation is correct university's interpretation this would be the first time that the general this is not the first time that the general assembly has done this and number three the union has just suggested that the absence of the word only in that last paragraph section seven a suggests that you should labor relations ability and again it appears that the general assembly based on the agreement of the parties because if you read that legislative history it's clear that there were some references in a pit here an organization for the union gaiety and the university had agreed to this bill language based on that agreement and based on the general assembly's wording of tenured tenure track back the would be the university's position that this does foster and promote one of the