Opinion ID: 753713
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Adornetti Appellants' Claim

Text: 59 The Adornetti appellants claim that the VSF implementing legislation, 1987 N.Y.Laws ch. 844, limiting VSF-benefit eligibility to for service retirees, impaired their contractual rights to VSF benefits created in a 1968 collective bargaining agreement (CBA) between the Patrolman's Benevolent Association and New York City. That CBA states: The purpose of [the VSF] shall be to provide a supplemental benefit on a variable annuity basis, for Articles I and II, as determined by the trustees. Castellano v. Board, 937 F.2d at 754. Although that CBA by its terms did not apply to transit police officers (but rather to members of another police pension fund), appellants claim entitlement to the contractual rights to the VSF benefits that the CBA allegedly conferred, pursuant to § 13-157(j)(2) of the Code, which provides: 60 [E]ach transit police member shall have and shall be entitled and subject to the same rights, benefits, privileges, and obligations as a member of the police force of the city who is a member of the police pension fund maintained pursuant to subchapter two of chapter two of this title, with respect to the matters provided for in [sixteen listed sections of the Code]. 61 We express no opinion as to whether or not § 13-157(j)(2) confers upon transit police officers the benefits bestowed by the PBA's CBA, because we easily hold that, even if it did, the PBA's CBA creates no contractual entitlement to VSF benefits. Art. I, § 10 of the Constitution provides: No State shall ... pass any ... Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts. Where there is no contractual relationship, however, there can be no impairment. See General Motors Corp. v. Romein, 503 U.S. 181, 186, 112 S.Ct. 1105, 1109-10, 117 L.Ed.2d 328 (1992). This court has previously rejected a Contract Clause claim brought by police retirees based upon the same CBA, holding that the CBA plainly did not create any contractual obligation, but only established a general fund the beneficiaries of which were to be determined later by the legislature. See Castellano v. Board, 937 F.2d at 757. For the reasons stated in Castellano v. Board, we reject the Adornetti appellants' Contract Clause claim.