Court Opinion

ID: 9709654
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 03:52:42.903738+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:49.815596
License: Public Domain

OPINION
McDERMOTT, Justice.
This appeal seeks to end ten years of litigation which originally arose when the Commonwealth refused to bargain with a duly authorized bargaining unit representing the Commonwealth’s social service employees 1 about the issue of employee caseload.2
An unfair labor practices charge was lodged by the union pursuant to the Pennsylvania Employe Relations Act (PERA)3 on February 22, 1973, charging that the Commonwealth refused to bargain in good faith under PERA, 43 P.S. § 1101.1201(a)(1) and (a)(5). The Commonwealth insisted that the issue was not a matter subject to bargaining under section 701 of PERA4 but was a matter of “inherent *240managerial policy” under section 702.5 Pursuant to section 702, the Commonwealth offered to “meet and discuss” the issue.
Following a hearing, the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board (hereinafter “Board”) agreed with the Commonwealth that caseload was a matter of inherent managerial policy, and that the Commonwealth complied with its statutory duty in offering to meet and discuss. Consequently, the Board decided that refusing to bargain over a managerial prerogative such as caseload was not an unfair labor practice.
The Board’s decision was affirmed by the Commonwealth Court in Pennsylvania Social Services Union v. Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board, 15 Pa.Cmwlth. 441, 325 A.2d 659 (1974). However, this Court, in a per curiam decision, 474 Pa. 168, 377 A.2d 1267, vacated the decisions of the Board and the Commonwealth Court and remanded in light of our decision in Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board v. State College Area School District, 461 Pa. 494, 337 A.2d 262 (1975). Another hearing was held and, initially, in a NISI Decision and Order, the Board found caseload to be a subject for mandatory collective bargaining and that the Commonwealth committed an unfair labor practice in refusing to bargain. The Commonwealth filed exceptions and the Board reversed itself pursuant to Board rules.6 34 Pa.Code § 95.98(f). The Board found again that there was *241no unfair labor practice. The Commonwealth Court affirmed the Board’s decision. Joint Bargaining Committee of Pennsylvania Social Services Union v. Commonwealth, Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board, 68 Pa. Cmwlth. 307, 449 A.2d 96 (1982).
Our scope of review is limited. A decision of the Board must be upheld if the Board’s findings are supported by substantial evidence, and if the conclusions drawn from those facts are reasonable, and not capricious, arbitrary or illegal. 43 P.S. § 1101.1501; Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board, 502 Pa. 7, 11-12, 463 A.2d 409, 411, (1983); St. Joseph’s Hospital v. Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board, 473 Pa. 101, 104, 373 A.2d 1069, 1071 (1977); In re Appeal of Cumberland Valley School District, 483 Pa. 134, 139, 394 A.2d 946, 949 (1978). This Court “will not lightly substitute its judgment for that of a body selected for its expertise whose experience and expertise make it better qualified than a court of law to weigh facts within its field.” Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board v. Butz, 411 Pa. 360, 377, 192 A.2d 707, 716 (1963); Appeal of Cumberland Valley School District, supra., 483 Pa. at 140, 394 A.2d at 949. See also, Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board v. Mars Area School District, 480 Pa. 295, 389 A.2d 1073 (1978), where we deferred to the Board’s expertise and reinstated the final decision of the Board, holding that the decision to terminate teacher aides and replace them with volunteers was not inherent managerial policy and thus mandatorily bargainable.
Thus, the issue here is whether there was substantial evidence on the record to support the Board’s conclusion that assignment of caseload was a managerial prerogative, and/or whether the Board erred as a matter of law in making its conclusion.
The starting point in our review of this case is Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board v. State College Area School District, supra., which dealt with the relationship between sections 701 and 702 of PERA. Section 701 requires good faith bargaining on issues pertaining to “wag*242es, hours and other terms and conditions of employment.” While section 701 is restricted to these three items, the latter phrase — “terms and conditions” — is a broad one, since almost any matter confronting employees in the workplace can be viewed as affecting a term or condition of employment.
Meanwhile, section 702 gives public employers the license to refuse to bargain over matters of “inherent managerial policy,” otherwise known as management prerogatives. The provision supplies an expansive definition of what constitutes “inherent managerial policy,” including but not “limited to such areas of discretion or policy as the functions and programs of the public employer, standards of services, its overall budget, utilization of technology, the organizational structure and selection and direction of personnel.” Again, almost anything touching on managerial discretion could be regarded as “inherent managerial policy,” and therefore beyond the sphere of mandatory bargaining. Without a proper balance, the two sections might negate each other, a result which the legislature surely did not intend in passing PERA.
In resolving this conflict, the Court noted that prior to PERA, public employees were barred from striking and public employers were not required to engage in collective bargaining. PERA sought to correct what the legislature perceived as an “intolerable situation” by giving public employees the right to bargain collectively, tempered by the public sector’s right and responsibility to manage the government, preserve public funds and protect the overall public interest. State College, Id. 461 Pa. at 502-503, 337 A.2d at 267-68. The Court then announced the following balancing test:
[WJhere an item of dispute is a matter of fundamental concern to the employes’ interest in wages, hours and other terms and conditions of employment, it is not removed as a matter subject to good faith bargaining under section 701 simply because it may touch upon basic policy. It is the duty of the Board in the first instance and the *243courts thereafter to determine whether the impact of the issue on the interest of the employe in wages, hours and terms and conditions of employment outweighs its probable effect on the basic policy of the system as a whole. If it is determined that the matter is one of inherent managerial policy but does affect wages, hours and terms and conditions of employment, the public employer shall be required to meet and discuss such subjects upon request by the public employe’s representative pursuant to section 702.
461 Pa. at 507, 337 A.2d at 268.
Other jurisdictions have gone both ways on the substantive issue of whether workload or caseload is mandatorily bargainable. One case, for example, citing our State College balancing test, held that the workload of instructors, counselors and librarians in a community college system was the prerogative of management and thus not bargainable. Metropolitan Technical Community College Education Association v. Metropolitan Technical Community College Area, 203 Neb. 832, 281 N.W.2d 201, 206 (1979). The court found that the issue struck at the heart of the policy of the system as a whole, outweighing the recognized impact on working conditions. Contra, Byram Township Board of Education v. Byram Township Education Association, 152 N.J.Super. 12, 377 A.2d 745 (1977).
In this case, the Board, applying the State College balancing test, found that caseload is inherently managerial policy. While recognizing that the issue of caseload impacts on an employee’s interest in hours and terms and conditions of employment, they concluded that administrative control over caseload, unconstrained by a term in a collective bargaining agreement, has a more compelling impact on the Commonwealth’s social welfare system as a whole.
This conclusion is amply supported by evidence in the record. Each person walking into the door of a Commonwealth social welfare agency presents a different situation, requiring varying degrees of time and effort. The flow of cases into the system varies greatly as well, from time to time, from county to county, influenced by ever changing *244and unpredictable social and economic trends. A catastrophe like a flood or fire, for example, in a particular area could mean a sudden surge in cases. Administrative constraints placed on the Commonwealth’s social welfare apparatus by the legislature and the federal government, increasing paper work and time spent per case, alters the responsibility of administrators. Factors such as these compel a conclusion that the Commonwealth requires flexibility in assigning and shifting caseload within an agency, affecting organizational structure, standards of services to be rendered, control of the overall budget and selection and direction of personnel. As the Board concluded in its order:
Cases are generated from society to a governmental agency without a significant amount of control on the part of the public employer as to the cases which will constitute the workload of a given agency. The only means by which a public employer may adjust a social services workload are means which impact heavily on management prerogatives.
Board Final Order at 2.
Based on the record, we agree with the Board that control over caseload is not a matter which simply touches “upon basic policy,” but is “directly determinative of policy particularly in the reserved areas of standards of service and selection and direction of personnel.” Board Final Order at 6.
We do not hold in this case that caseload is always a managerial prerogative. In some factual settings caseload might indeed be a mandatory subject of bargaining, as the impact of unbridled discretion over caseload assignment on an employee’s interest in wages, hours and terms and conditions of employment might outweigh the impact on the basic policy of the system as a whole.7
We hold merely that there was substantial evidence on the record as a whole to support the Board’s conclusion *245that discretion over the assignment of caseload in the Commonwealth’s social service system had a vital impact on the policy of the system so to outweigh the employee’s interest in the issue, as affecting wages, hours and terms and conditions of employment; that the Commonwealth was not guilty of an unfair labor practice in refusing to bargain about the issue; and that the Commonwealth fulfilled its duty under PERA by offering to meet and discuss the issue with the union. The order of the Commonwealth Court, affirming the Board’s decision, is affirmed.
LARSEN, J., files a dissenting opinion.

. The employees represented by the Union include assistant technicians, caseworkers, therapeutic activities worker-recreational and psychological associates.

. For the purposes of this appeal, the issue of “caseload” (also referred to as “workload”), pertains to managerial discretion over the assignment of the number of cases Commonwealth social services employees would be required to handle. The appellants state that their concern is over "the quantum of work required by a particular configuration of case assignments.” (Appellant’s Brief at 8, fn. 2.) Since the concern of the appellant is with assignment of cases to social services employees, it is not necessary here to address their assignment of error to the Commonwealth Court in saying that the union only represents professional employees. The workload of employees who do not handle cases is not at issue here.

. Act of July 23, 1970, P.L. 563, No. 195, art. I, §§ 101 et seq. Pa.Stat.Ann. tit. 43, §§ 1101.101 et seq.

. 43 P.S. § 1101.701 provides:
Collective bargaining is the performance of the mutual obligation of the public employer and the representative of the public employes to meet at reasonable times and confer in good faith with respect to wages, hours and other terms and conditions of employment, or the negotiation of an agreement or any question arising thereunder and the execution of a written contract incorporating any agreement reached but such obligation does not compel either party to agree to a proposal or require the making of a concession.

. 43 P.S. § 1101.702 reads:
Public employers shall not be required to bargain over matters of inherent managerial policy, which shall include but shall not be limited to such areas of discretion or policy as the functions and programs of the public employer, standards of services, its overall budget, utilization of technology, the organizational structure and selection and direction of personnel. Public employers, however, shall be required to meet and discuss on policy matters affecting wages, hours and terms and conditions of employment as well as the impact thereon upon request by public employe representatives. (Emphasis supplied.)

. The appellant also argues that the Board acted unreasonably in reversing its NISI decision. We do not agree. The Board’s final order was thorough and well thought out, stating compelling reasons for its change of heart.

. Moreover, as the Board concluded, the impact of additional caseload itself on wages, hours and working conditions conceivably would be mandatorily bargainable. Board Final Order at 8. Further, an individual employee confronted with an oppressive' caseload would have *245the remedy of arbitration of a grievance pursuant to PERA. See 43 P.S. § 1101.903.