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fmcini
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Date Posted: 21:07:12 08/15/09 Sat
WORCESTER — The union representing correction officers and sergeants at the Worcester County Jail and House of Correction in West Boylston has filed a lawsuit accusing Sheriff Guy W. Glodis of unilaterally changing some jail employees’ work schedules in violation of their collective bargaining agreement and state law.
According to the suit, which was filed yesterday in Worcester Superior Court by Local 550 of the New England Police Benevolent Association, the sheriff’s office notified the union last month that about 220 permanent officers who had been working a weekly schedule of four days on and two days off would be put on a schedule of five days on and two days off, effective Aug. 1.
The union was told the change was necessary because of a “financial emergency,” according to the lawsuit.
The sheriff’s office had earlier proposed abolishing the four and two work schedule during contract negotiations, but the change had not been accepted or ratified by the union, the suit states. Renewed collective bargaining negotiations are scheduled next month, according to the suit, which describes changes to work schedules as “mandatory subjects for bargaining.”
In a brief in support of a preliminary injunction Local 550 is seeking that would enjoin the sheriff from implementing the change until the case is decided on its merits, union lawyer Kevin E. Buck said affected officers had expressed concerns about day care issues, obligations to ailing relatives, an inability to spend time with their families on weekends and the possibility that their spouses’ work schedules would also have to be altered.
A court hearing on the injunction request is scheduled for 2 p.m. Tuesday.
Jail Superintendent Jeffrey R. Turco said the change was necessary to avoid layoffs and furloughs of correction officers in the face of a $4.5 million reduction in the jail’s budget for the fiscal year that began July 1. Under the four and two schedule, officers were being paid for 12 days per year that they did not work, according to Mr. Turco.
“We pick up 96 hours per man of additional work hours,” under the five and two schedule, reducing the need for overtime pay and the use of temporary officers to fill shifts, he said. Mr. Turco said it was the sheriff’s position that the current contract allows for the change.
“We’re not asking our COs to do anything that other COs across the state aren’t doing,” he said.
Mr. Turco said members of other unions at the jail, which employs about 650 people, were being forced to take 26 furlough days as a result of the budget cut from $45.7 million to $41.2 million. The reduction has also resulted in the closing of a minimum-security building at the West Boylston facility, according to Mr. Turco.
He described the change in work schedules as “the best of the alternatives in order to preserve COs.”
The union’s suit seeks unspecified financial damages with interest, costs and attorneys’ fees.
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