Opinion ID: 2118776
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Local Law 53 and Executive Order 52 of 1967

Text: To implement the Agreement, the Council adopted Local Law No. 53 (1967) of the City of New York, effective September 1, 1967, which created the Office of Collective Bargaining, including a seven-member Board of Collective Bargaining (two City representatives, two labor representatives, and three impartial members), and the Board of Certification. The salaries and expenses of the impartial members of the Board of Collective Bargaining were shared by the City and the Municipal Labor Committee, an association known by that name created pursuant to a memorandum dated March thirty-first, nineteen hundred sixty-six [i.e., the Agreement], as amended, signed by representatives of the city and certain employee organizations (former Administrative Code § 1173-3.0 [k], as added by Local Law 53 § 2). Local Law 53 provided procedures for the final determination of representation questions; the mediation of contract negotiations; and impasse panels. It also set up procedures for the arbitration of grievances; for interpretation of its provisions; for final determinations as to the scope of collective bargaining under the terms of the applicable executive order, or the arbitrability of particular grievances; and for ascertaining if the City or a particular union had given full-faith compliance to the law's requirements and obligations. As for the scope of bargaining, former section 1173-3.0 (m) of the Administrative Code stated that [t]he term `matters within the scope of collective bargaining' shall mean matters designated to be within the scope of collective bargaining by executive order  (emphasis added). In addition, former section 1173-4.0 (a) specified in relevant part that the Administrative Code's provisions were applicable only to [a]ll mayoral agencies and to the employees and employee organizations thereof, provided that the mayor elects by executive order to make such provisions applicable to all such agencies, [employees and employee] organizations (emphasis added). Concomitantly, the Mayor issued Executive Order 52 of 1967. Section 5, entitled Matters Within the Scope of Collective Bargaining, stated at section 5 (a) that the City would have the duty to bargain in good faith (2) with a certified employee organization, council or group of certified employee organizations designated by the Board of Certification as representing more than 50 per cent of all employees subject to the Career and Salary Plan, and only with such employee organization or organizations, on City-wide matters which must be uniform for all such employees, such as overtime, and time and leave rules. The terms agreed upon in such bargaining shall be applicable to and binding upon all such employees.... The foregoing shall not: (A) prevent the City from meeting with any other employee organization representing such employees for the purpose of hearing the views and requests of its members on such matters ...; or [be] construed to deny the City or a certified employee organization the right to bargain for a variation or a particular application of any city-wide policy or any term of an agreement executed pursuant to this Section 5 (a) (2) governing any City-wide matter, where considerations unique to a particular department, class of employees, or collective bargaining unit are involved. (3) with an employee organization, council or group of employee organizations designated by the Board of Certification as representing more than 50 per cent of all employees within a department on matters which must be uniform for all employees in the department, but only if such organization, or in the case of a group or council, each organization in such group or council, has been previously certified as a City-wide bargaining representative for an appropriate bargaining unit. The foregoing shall not prevent the City from meeting with any other employee organization representing such employees for the purpose of hearing the views and requests of its members on such matters.... (4) with certified employee organizations representing employees in the uniformed forces of the police, fire, sanitation and correction services on City-wide matters, including, but not limited to pensions, overtime, and time and leave rules insofar as such issues affect the particular service involved. (5) on pensions for employees other than those in the uniformed forces referred to in Section 5 (a) (4) herein, only with a certified employee organization, council, or group of certified employee organizations designated by the Board of Certification as representing more than 50 per cent of all employees included in the pension system involved  (Executive Order 52 of 1967, dated Sept. 29, 1967, reprinted in City Record, Oct. 6, 1967, at 6342 [emphasis added]). Thus, Executive Order 52 implemented two-tiered bargaining and exempted police, fire, sanitation and correction services employees from it, as agreed to by the Mayor and the unions in 1966 in the Agreement. Executive Order 52 repeated the language from the Agreement to the effect that citywide bargaining would not prevent the City from meeting with any union for purposes of hearing its views and proposals on citywide matters or pensions; and declared that its provisions respecting citywide bargaining should not be construed to deny the City or any union the right to bargain for a variation or a particular application of a citywide policy or term of agreement where considerations unique to a particular department, class of employees, or collective bargaining unit are involved.