Opinion ID: 2610801
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: does as 23.40.210 require exhaustion of contractual grievance or arbitration procedures prerequisite to agency jurisdiction over an unfair labor practice claim?

Text: The Agency gives great weight to federal decisions in the area of labor relations. 2 AAC 10.440(b). [4] We have looked to decisions of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in interpreting Alaska's labor laws. [5] Numerous cases decided under the Labor Management Relations Act (LMRA), 29 U.S.C.A. § 141 et seq. (1973), which grants federal courts jurisdiction to enforce the terms of collective bargaining agreements, see id. § 187, confirm that the NLRB has power to provide statutory remedies for unfair labor practices despite the availability of existing, nonexhausted, contractual grievance and arbitration processes. See, e.g., Carey v. Westinghouse Electric Corp., 375 U.S. 261, 271, 84 S.Ct. 401, 408, 11 L.Ed.2d 320 (1964) (NLRB may, under express language of § 10 of the LMRA, adjudicate disputes otherwise arbitrable, and the Board also has discretion to decline jurisdiction in favor of contractual grievance mechanisms); see also Collyer v. Insulated Wire, 192 NLRB 837 (1971). The Board's power to refuse to defer to grievance and arbitration mechanisms is derived from § 10 of the LMRA, which provides in relevant part: The Board is empowered ... to prevent any person from engaging in any unfair labor practice... . This power shall not be affected by any other means of adjustment or prevention that has been or may be established by agreement, law or otherwise... . 29 U.S.C. § 160(a). Alaska's Public Employment Relations Act (PERA or Act) [6] contains no similar reservation clause. However, AS 23.40.210 provides, in relevant part: The [collective bargaining] agreement shall include a grievance procedure which shall have binding arbitration as its final step. Either party to the agreement has a right of action to enforce the agreement by petition to the labor relations agency. (Emphasis added). On its face, this language does not explicitly answer the question whether adherence to the grievance mechanisms of a collective bargaining agreement is a mandatory prerequisite to the Agency's jurisdiction, or whether the Agency may exercise jurisdiction over unfair labor practice claims which are the subject of pending grievance procedures. AS 23.40.120, establishing the Agency's unfair labor practice jurisdiction, provides that the Agency  shall investigate claims of unfair labor practices (emphasis added). Whether the Agency may adjudicate such claims, despite contract provisions providing for grievance-arbitration procedures, is the issue for decision here. The legislative history of AS 23.40.210 is not particularly enlightening. [7] Given the ambiguous language of the statute and the absence of relevant legislative history, we construe this statutory language so as to adopt a rule of law that is most persuasive in light of precedent, reason, and policy. Guin v. Ha, 591 P.2d 1281, 1284 n. 6 (Alaska 1979). Under federal labor law, the NLRB has the authority to bypass contractual grievance processes and provide a statutory remedy in circumstances similar to those presented in the case at bar. Here PSEA alleges that the State committed unfair labor practices in violation of AS 23.40.110(a)(1), (2) and (5) by unilaterally transferring employees in one bargaining unit to another unit without negotiation. In the words of the Agency, The State engaged in a prohibited practice within the meaning of AS 23.40 by reclassifying the State Trooper recruits to college interns III and IV during 1986 and redesignating those reclassified employees as members of the APEA-GGU bargaining unit rather than maintaining them within the PSEA bargaining unit. This practice violated the obligation to bargain in good faith with respect to terms and conditions, and constituted a unilateral change without appropriate bargaining concerning the position transfers from the PSEA bargaining unit to the APEA-GGU bargaining unit  violating AS 23.110(a)(5). The movement of employees from PSEA to APEA interfered with any expectations or presumptions those employees may have had to remain within PSEA and benefit thereby  violating AS 23.40.110(a)(1)  and interfered with the existence of PSEA as a representative of designated employees  violating AS 23.40.110(a)(2). [8] This Court has previously held that AS 23.40.110 prohibits essentially the same conduct prohibited by federal labor laws. In particular, we have held that paragraphs (a)(1) and (a)(3) of AS 23.40.110 are substantially similar to §§ 8(a)(1) and (a)(3) of the LMRA, 29 U.S.C. § 158(a)(1) and (a)(3). Alaska Community Colleges' Fed'n of Teachers, Local 2404 v. University of Alaska, 669 P.2d 1299, 1302 & n. 1 (Alaska 1983). We further note that AS 23.40.110(a)(2) (employer may not dominate or interfere with the formation, existence or administration of an organization) and (a)(5) (employer may not refuse to bargain collectively in good faith) also prohibit conduct similar to that proscribed by LMRA §§ 8(a)(2) and (a)(5). Under the LMRA, the NLRB has declined to defer to grievance arbitration processes in a variety of circumstances. [9] Historically, the Board has seen a series of changes in its deferral practices. In 1971 the Board appeared to adopt a relatively restrictive policy in favor of deferral in Collyer Insulated Wire, 192 NLRB 837, 77 LRRM 1931 (1971). There the Board articulated several factors influencing its determination to defer to grievance arbitration processes in a case involving an employer's unilateral alteration of working conditions, an alleged violation of § 8(a)(5). The dispute arose within the confines of a long and productive collective-bargaining relationship; there was no claim of employer animosity to the employees' exercise of protected rights; the parties' contract provided for arbitration in a very broad range of disputes; the arbitration clause clearly encompassed the dispute at issue; the employer had asserted its willingness to utilize arbitration to resolve the dispute; and the dispute was eminently well suited to resolution by arbitration. In these circumstances, deferral to the arbitral process merely gave full effect to the parties' agreement to submit disputes to arbitration. United Technologies, 268 NLRB 83, 115 LRRM 1044, 1050 (1984) (discussing Collyer Insulated Wire ). In General American Transportation, 228 NLRB 808, 94 LRRM 1483 (1977), however, the Board abruptly changed course, [10] announcing that as a general rule it would decline to defer to contractual grievance arbitration procedures in cases where the alleged violations of provisions of the LMRA relates to employer interference with employees' right to self-organization ... [and] other concerted activity ... (§ 8(a)(1) violations), [11] discrimination in regard to hire or tenure of employment ... (§ 8(a)(3) violations), [12] and in certain cases presenting allegations of employee unfair practices (which are not relevant to this appeal). [13] Under the Board's General American Transportation rule, unfair practice claims analogous to those presented to the Agency in the instant case likely would have been heard by the Board without deferral to contractual dispute resolution mechanisms, inasmuch as PSEA's complaints alleged, in part, claims premised on state law provisions analogous to § 8(a)(1). Yet in the subsequent case of United Technologies, 268 NLRB 83, 115 LRRM 1049, 1051 (1984), the Board again reversed its deferral policy, departing from General American Transportation and resuscitating the Collyer Board's policy in favor of deferral, at least in cases arising under §§ 8(a)(1) (employer interference with employees' right to organize and engage in concerted activity) and 8(a)(3) (discrimination by employer with respect to terms and conditions). [14] Thus, under United Technologies, whether the Board viewed the facts of the instant case as presenting primarily an allegation of a § 8(a)(1) violation or as raising a § 8(a)(2) or (a)(5) claim could be determinative of the deferral policy the Board would apply. [15] As the foregoing discussion indicates, the Board enjoys substantial discretion to determine its own deferral policy under the LMRA. State courts have held that a state labor agency need not defer to contractual grievance arbitration procedures where the state law counterpart of an unfair labor practice is alleged. Of particular interest is Fasi v. State Public Employment Rel. Bd., 60 Haw. 436, 591 P.2d 113 (1979). There the Supreme Court of Hawaii was presented with circumstances substantially similar to those of the instant case. A union of public employees had filed a grievance based on a seniority clause of their collective bargaining agreement with the City and County of Honolulu. The grievance was pursued by the union through the first three of four contractual grievance arbitration steps. Subsequently, the Mayor of Honolulu, acting as the City's representative, filed a petition with the Hawaii Public Employment Relations Board seeking a declaration that the seniority clause was not illegal under an applicable statute. The ruling was expressly sought in order to determine the validity of the grievance... . Id. 591 P.2d at 115. The matter proposed for Board decision, therefore, was squarely within the ambit of the contractual arbitration language applicable to the grievance pending for resolution at stage four. The Board entered a decision which sustained the jurisdiction of the Board to respond to the petition and provide a declaratory ruling, id. at 114, despite the pendency of arbitral proceedings concerned with precisely the same question. In enforcement proceedings, however, the state circuit court reversed the Board's ruling on the ground that the Board lacked jurisdiction to issue a ruling on the matter which was pending arbitration. Id. at 116. The circuit court concluded (as summarized by the Hawaiian high court) that the parties were bound by the collective bargaining agreement to submit the dispute to an arbitrator, who should first determine that he has jurisdiction and, if he should so determine, should proceed to decide the matter on its merits... . Id. at 116. With the issues thus framed, the Supreme Court of Hawaii reversed, recognizing the Board's power to refuse to defer to contractual grievance arbitration mechanisms in the unfair labor practice case. Neither the existence of applicable arbitration processes, nor the inevitability of a measure of contractual interpretation by the state Board, was sufficient to deter the court from holding that The willful failure of an employer to observe the terms of a collective bargaining agreement is defined by [statute] as a prohibited practice, with respect to which [§ 89-5(b)(4)] empowers the Board, upon complaints by employers, employees, and employee organizations, to take such action with respect thereto as it deems necessary and proper. Since the meaning and effect of a collective bargaining agreement must be determined by the Board in the course of determining whether an employer is in violation of the agreement and is engaging in a prohibited practice, the meaning and effect of the agreement between [the City] and [the Union] was a question which related to an action which the Board might take in the exercise of its powers. The applicability of [the unfair practice statute] to the collective bargaining agreement is therefore a question which was properly placed before the Board by the petition... . Id. at 117-18. Thus, construing a statute no more conclusive as to the issue than Alaska's Labor Relations Act, the Supreme Court of Hawaii held that Hawaii's Labor Board is not required to defer its unfair labor practice jurisdiction to pending grievance arbitration proceedings. [16] The Agency's refusal to defer in the instant case was justified under the circumstances. The Agency's decision to reach the merits of PSEA's unfair labor practice claim was premised on its view that requiring PSEA to follow the contractual dispute resolution agenda further was very arguably a futile act. The Agency noted that Commissioner Sundberg had indicated clearly that in his view the dispute was not arbitrable, [17] thereby foreclosing step three of the grievance procedure, and that the Commissioner of Administration, whose opinion would have constituted step four, had previously rejected PSEA's position. The Agency should not be prohibited in such circumstances from taking jurisdiction to decide whether the State has committed an unfair labor practice by unilaterally reclassifying unit employees, since only through a determination of the validity of the reclassification itself can the union challenge the Commissioner's ruling that the contractual grievance procedure did not apply to these employees. That is, Agency review of the unfair labor practice claim was highly desirable during the pendency of the grievance because it enabled the grievance process to proceed effectively. In enacting PERA, the legislature granted to employee organizations a statutory right to invoke the Act's remedial provisions despite the simultaneous availability of grievance arbitration processes. For although AS 23.40.210 mandates that each collective bargaining agreement shall include a grievance procedure which shall have binding arbitration as its final step, it further provides: [e]ither party to the agreement has a right of action to enforce the agreement by petition to the [Alaska] labor relations agency. To hold that the availability of arbitration precludes an unfair practice proceeding before the Agency where such a proceeding is otherwise available would, as argued by PSEA, render the Agency's unfair practice jurisdiction superfluous, since the only instances in which it could be invoked would be situations where no collective agreement existed. We have previously rejected the argument that the availability of arbitration precludes statutory remedies. In Public Safety Employees Ass'n v. State, 658 P.2d 769 (Alaska 1983), we held that under the Uniform Residential Landlord and Tenant Act (URLTA), AS 34.03.010-.380, the existence of the arbitration remedy [does not] preclude[] the exercise of the statutory remedy. 658 P.2d at 774. In so holding, we observed that other state and federal courts have, [i]n circumstances involving coincident arbitral and statutory avenues of relief, ... held that arbitration does not afford an exclusive remedy. Id. at 775. [18] We thus hold that in the case at bar the presence of grievance and arbitration provisions in the PSEA-state contract neither deprived PSEA of its statutory right to press its unfair practice claim before the Board, nor deprived the Agency of jurisdiction to hear that claim.