NEPBA WINS PAY ARBITRATION FOR WESTON POLICE ASSOCIATION LOCAL 77
NEPBA Local 77, Weston Police Association v. Town of Weston – Case 01-22-0002-6279
On April 8, 2022 the Town of Weston (“Town”) provided notice to all members, that effective July 1, 2022, they would be converted from a weekly payroll cycle to a biweekly payroll cycle. The NEPBA filed a grievance arguing that the language in Article 10.14 only allowed for the Town to covert members from a weekly to a bi-weekly payroll if all other Town and School unions were also in agreement.
The grievance at issue involves a question of contractual interpretation, specifically, whether or not Article 10.14 of the Parties’ CBA allowed the Town to convert unit members from a weekly, to a biweekly payroll cycle, absent the express consent/agreement of all other Town and School unions. The NEPBA argued that the language at issue, Article 10.14 of the Parties’ CBA, clearly and unambiguously required that all Town and School unions, including but not limited to the bargaining unit members of NEPBA Local 77, agree to be moved to a biweekly payroll before the Town could make such a change. The NEPBA offered evidence to establish that in fact not all School and Town unions had agreed to move to a biweekly payroll cycle, and as such, the Town had violated the terms of the Parties’ CBA when they unilaterally converted members to a biweekly payroll cycle in July of 2022 without the express consent of all other Town and School Unions.
Following arbitration, the arbitrator held in favor of the NEPBA finding in part, “when evaluating whether all Town unions agreed to bi-weekly pay, it is appropriate to give Article 10.14, and all like clauses including those in the Fire, Dispatcher, and DPW union contracts, the meaning provided above that they agreed pending agreement of all of the other Town unions, and that they were not themselves going to frustrate that provision of their contract.
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