2010AP535 Milwaukee District Council 48 v. Milwaukee County

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Labor
Arbitration

An arbitration decision that a county violated the union’s collective bargaining agreement by reducing work hours is not void.

“Insofar as whether the Award violates ‘a strong public policy,’ see Racine County, 2008 WI 70, ¶11, 310 Wis. 2d at 519, 751 N.W.2d at 317, the Award does not run afoul of that exception to the invulnerability of arbitration awards because reasonable persons might disagree whether Walker’s order was the appropriate way of making up a budget shortfall, especially in light of the fact that the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors has not passed the resolution that the Arbitrator determined would permit Walker to do what he did. This is clear from the supreme court’s analysis earlier this year of an arbitration award’s public-policy implications: It is a rare occasion for this court to overturn an arbitration award on public policy grounds. The public policy exception to the general rule of judicial deference should be narrowly construed and limited to situations where the public policy ‘is well defined and dominant, and is to be ascertained by reference to the laws and legal precedents and not from general considerations of supposed public interests.’ Sands v. Menard, Inc., 2010 WI 96, ¶50, ___ Wis. 2d ___, 787 N.W.2d 384, 397 (quoted source omitted). Sands overturned that aspect of an arbitration award that forced a lawyer on a reluctant client because the attorney-client ‘relationship was irretrievably broken’ and if the lawyer accepted the award’s remedy of reinstatement she ‘would be forced to violate her ethical obligations as an attorney.’ Id., 2010 WI 96, ¶¶2, 49, 57, 70, ___ Wis. 2d at ___, 787 N.W.2d at 387, 397, 399, 401. Significantly, even in Sands, three justices would have upheld the arbitration award in light of the general invulnerability of such awards. Id., 2010 WI 96, ¶112, ___ Wis. 2d at ___, 787 N.W.2d at 410-411 (Abrahamson, Ch. J., dissenting).”
Reversed and Remanded.

Publication in the official reports is recommended.

2010AP535 Milwaukee District Council 48 v. Milwaukee County

Dist. I, Milwaukee County, Flynn, J., Fine, J.

Attorneys: For Appellant: Sweet, Mark A., Milwaukee; For Respondent: Jorgensen, John F., Milwaukee; Schoewe, Timothy R., Milwaukee

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