Background
For decades, Los Angeles city employees moving between the Department of Water and Power and other city employment could carry pension service credit between two retirement systems. DWP withdrew from that reciprocity arrangement, and the City later suspended it by ordinance. A coalition of employee unions claimed the City had failed to bargain over ways to soften the consequences for represented workers.
The Los Angeles Employee Relations Board agreed that the City violated its duty to engage in effects bargaining. It ordered bargaining and directed the City to make affected employees whole for reduced pensions or other losses caused by unilateral implementation until the bargaining obligation was satisfied. The superior court enforced that order and awarded the coalition private-attorney-general fees. The City conceded a bargaining violation but challenged the board’s remedial authority, the scope of relief, and the fee award.
The Court’s Holding
The Court of Appeal affirmed. The City’s labor board had authority under the municipal labor framework to remedy an unfair practice with make-whole relief. Restoring losses caused during a period of unlawful unilateral action is a conventional labor remedy tied to the board’s assigned task; it did not improperly amend the pension ordinance or invade legislative power.
The remedy also was not invalid merely because the underlying pension change itself was a permissible policy decision. The unlawful act was implementing the change without first completing required effects bargaining, and the board could restore employees to the economic position they would have occupied while lawful bargaining occurred. Questions about individual losses and calculations could be resolved during compliance rather than defeating the order as vague or overbroad.
The coalition also remained entitled to Code of Civil Procedure section 1021.5 fees. Its enforcement action vindicated an important public right governing collective bargaining, conferred a significant benefit on a substantial group of public employees, and justified private enforcement. As the prevailing party, it could also recover reasonable appellate fees.
Key Takeaways
- A public employer’s authority to make a policy change does not eliminate its separate duty to bargain over the effects of that change.
- A local employee-relations board may use make-whole relief to compensate losses caused during unlawful unilateral implementation.
- A remedial order can leave employee-specific calculations to later compliance proceedings without being impermissibly vague.
- Unions that enforce public-sector bargaining rights may qualify for private-attorney-general fees, including fees incurred on appeal.
Why It Matters
California public agencies should not assume that conceding only an effects-bargaining violation limits exposure to a prospective bargaining order. If employees lose pension or other economic benefits during the unlawful period, the remedy may reach those losses. Unions should preserve proof of causation and employee-level damages from the date the employer’s bargaining duty arose.
Read the full opinion (PDF) · Court docket