Opinion ID: 1449486
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Layoff as Defined by the Personnel Ordinance

Text: Section 2.523, Rule VII(5), [2] of the Personnel Ordinance designates the permissible reasons for laying off an employee. Stanfill's termination notice stated that he was laid off due to a lack of work. Stanfill persuasively maintains that he was not laid off due to a lack of work because employees were still needed to maintain the treatment sewage facility where he was working. Stanfill argues that his termination was therefore not for a permissible reason under Rule VII(5). One of the permissible reasons for laying off an employee is that a material change has occurred in the organization. Section 2.523, Rule VII(5). The City contends that the collective bargaining agreement negotiated with the union created a material change in the organization of the sewage treatment plant, justifying the laying off of employees. We disagree. The City presented no evidence to the superior court that the sewage treatment system underwent any material change in its organization as a result of the collective bargaining agreement. The only change that occurred as a result of the bargaining agreement was a change in the composition of the City's personnel. We therefore cannot find that the collective bargaining agreement created a change in the system's organization. Rule VII(5) specifies that an employee may be laid off if it is necessary because of a shortage of funds or work, the abolition of the position, or other material changes in the duties or organization, or for related reasons which are outside the employee's control and which do not reflect discredit upon the service of the employee. (Emphasis added.) The City interprets related reasons as meaning any good reason, which it contends includes the collective bargaining agreement in this case. We disagree with this interpretation. We believe that related reason means exactly what it says  a reason related to any of the reasons previously set forth in the rule. Thus, Rule VII(5) permits an employee to be laid off only for reasons related to a shortage of funds or work, the abolition of the position, or other material changes in the duties or organization. Stanfill was not laid off for any reason related to these designated reasons. In further opposition to the City's arguments, we note that Rule VII(5) permits the reassignment of duties performed by the laid-off employee to other employees already working. Implicit in this provision is the notion that layoffs are justified by the occasional need to decrease the number of employees and to restructure the duties of the remaining employees. This provision does not authorize the City to lay off an employee for the sole purpose of replacing him with and reassigning his duties to an employee who has been previously terminated for going on strike. For these reasons, we find that Stanfill's layoff does not fall within the meaning of Rule VII(5) of section 2.523. [3]