L.L. 2012/039

Enactment date: 6/28/2012

Int. No. 658-A

By Council Members Sanders, James, Williams, Lappin, Seabrook, Gennaro, Barron, Jackson, Eugene, Lander, Levin, Mealy, Mark-Viverito and Ulrich

A Local Law to amend the administrative code of the city of New York, in relation to the waiver of public employee organizations' rights when submitting grievances to arbitration under the New York city collective bargaining law.

Be it enacted by the Council as follows:

Section 1. Declaration of legislative findings and intent. The Council hereby finds that recent litigation has resulted in a judicial decision which holds that, when a public employee organization files a waiver to submit a grievance to arbitration pursuant to a collective bargaining agreement which the organization has with a public employer, the public employee organization waives its right to bring other administrative or judicial actions to address alleged violations of other statutes or rights not contained in the collective bargaining agreement. The Council finds that such a result is contrary to the New York City Office of Collective Bargaining's longstanding interpretation of the local law. The Council further finds that such a result unfairly prejudices the City's public employee organizations and the members they represent and that no similar waiver requirement exists in the New York State Taylor Law. Legislation is therefore necessary to rectify this disparity, in order to clarify that a public employee organization waives only its right to submit an alleged contractual dispute under the collective bargaining agreement and no other right when it submits a grievance to arbitration at the New York City Office of Collective Bargaining.

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[Consolidated provisions are not included in this Appendix A]

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§ 3. This local law shall take effect immediately.