WFSE/AFSCME sues governor over negotiated pay raises

The Washington Federation of State Employees/AFSCME today sued Gov. Chris Gregoire for not including a funding request in her budget proposal for the pay raises negotiated between the union and her office.

The lawsuit charges the governor, her budget director, Victor Moore, and the state with breach of contract and committing an unfair labor practice for bad-faith bargaining.

The lawsuit asks Thurston County Superior Court to compel the governor to submit a request to the Legislature to fund the pay raises and other economic parts of the five contracts negotiated by the Federation. The pacts cover 30,000 General Government workers and 10,000 employees at 12 community colleges and all four-year universities and The Evergreen State College.

The Legislature would still have the final say about funding the economic parts of the contract or rejecting them. Rejection sends the contracts back to the bargaining table.

The governor in her Dec. 18 budget roll out invoked a clause in the 2002 collective bargaining law and omitted funding for the negotiated pay raises and other economics. She said her Office of Financial Management had not certified the contracts as financially feasible.

(She did include funding for the negotiated health insurance package with premium shares staying at 12 percent.)

All of the Federation contracts were ratified by members and submitted to OFM by the Oct. 1 deadline set in law.

“Both parties agreed to the terms of that agreement, with the express or implied understanding that by this agreement, the director of OFM was committing to certify that the contractual commitments were financially feasible for the state…,” the lawsuit says.

“By the late summer of 2008, the defendants were well aware of and in fact had discussions with WFSE representatives about the downturn in the economy and the worsening economic conditions. These were reasons the financial aspects of the 2009-2011 (contracts)…were the lowest ever negotiated by the parties.”

Rep. Brendan Williams, D-Olympia, joined the lawsuit to challenge the idea that the financial feasibility clause in the 2002 law prohibits the 2009 Legislature from approving legislation funding the Federation’s contracts. “One Legislature (the 2002 Legislature) cannot enact a statute that prevents a future Legislature (the 2009 Legislature) from exercising its law-making power,” the lawsuit says.