Employment — accumulated sick-leave

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Wisconsin Court of Appeals

Civil

Employment — accumulated sick-leave

A public employee’s accumulated sick-leave is a vested right.

“The circuit court held that the sick-leave hours that Pasko and Porth accumulated under their unions’ contracts with Milwaukee County vested as they were earned.  Milwaukee County challenges this, arguing in essence that Pasko and Porth should not be able to bank those hours in order to get a cash payout at retirement because sick leave is designed to allow ill persons to stay home rather than go to work where they might not only infect others but also delay their recuperation.  Milwaukee County ignores, however, that its contracts with the unions representing Pasko and Porth permitted precisely that.  Although, as we have seen, Milwaukee County reinstated for non-union employees the four-hundred-hour/sixteen-percent-overage cap on the accumulation of sick-leave hours used to calculate the retirement payout, it did not do so in the union contracts under which Pasko and Porth worked before they were promoted to managerial non-union positions.  Thus, the circuit court recognized that Champine required the conclusion that during their tenure under those union contracts, Pasko’s and Porth’s sick-leave hours accumulated uncapped and became vested as they were earned.”

Affirmed.

Recommended for publication in the official reports.

2012AP2256 & 2012AP2257 Pasko v. Milwaukee County

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

Attorneys: For Appellant: Levy, Alan M., Milwaukee; For Respondent: Condon, Jacques C., Brookfield; Tuchalski, Michael Frank, Jr., Brookfield