Arbitrator’s decision over firefighters’ labor dispute affirmed by NY appeals court

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A state appeals court has reversed a lower court decision and reinstated an arbitrator’s decision in a labor dispute between two firefighters and the city of Utica.

In August 2023, state Supreme Court Justice Mark R. Rose, in Oneida County, denied an Article 75 petition seeking to confirm an arbitration ruling.

In a recent decision, the Appellate Division of state Supreme Court, Fourth Department, reversed Rose, granted the petition and confirmed the arbitration ruling.

The petition sought to confirm an arbitration ruling on a grievance filed over requests for emergency leave under the firefighters’ collective bargaining agreement (CBA).

The emergency leave provision of the CBA provides that emergency leave “shall be granted during a member’s tour of duty in the event of an unexpected serious illness of his wife, child, father, mother, brother, sister, mother-in-law, or father-in-law,” according to the Fourth Department decision.

A separate provision of the CBA provides that, where a grievance is settled by arbitration, the decision of the arbitrator “shall be final, conclusive and binding upon all parties” and “the arbitrator shall be strictly limited to the application and interpretation of the specific provision of the (CBA) and may not add to, modify or otherwise deviate from those provisions,” according to the Fourth Department decision.

Two Utica firefighters requested emergency leave to attend to family emergencies. At the time each firefighter learned of the emergency, they were off duty but scheduled to report for duty the following day.

Each firefighter’s request for emergency leave was made prior to their tour of duty. Although each firefighter was excused from the next day’s tour of duty, the city charged the missed time against their compensatory time, rather than treating it as paid emergency leave, because the requests were not made during the firefighter’s tour of duty.

The arbitrator concluded that nothing in the language of the emergency leave provision required that the emergency leave request be made during the member’s tour of duty.

The use of the phrase “during a member’s tour of duty” in the CBA’s emergency leave section was meant to allow the member to leave or miss work to attend to a family emergency, and the phrase addressed the period of time when the leave must be taken, not when the request must be made, the court wrote.

The arbitrator determined that the firefighters were entitled to paid emergency leave for the time in question and directed the city to restore the charged compensatory time.

Rose denied the petition that sought to confirm the arbitrator’s determination that the two firefighters were entitled to paid emergency leave. He ruled that the arbitrator’s grant of an emergency leave request that was made prior to a firefighter’s tour of duty added a new clause to the CBA in violation of the limits placed on the arbitrator’s authority in the CBA.

“The arbitrator merely interpreted and applied the provisions of the relevant CBA, as he had the authority to do,” the Fourth Department wrote.

“We are powerless to set aside that interpretation even if we disagree with it. Contrary to respondent’s urging, the arbitrator’s determination was not irrational; nothing in the CBA suggests that a request for emergency leave may not be made prior to the start of a tour of duty, and the arbitrator provided a justification for his determination,” the court wrote.

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