By: Derek Hawkins//March 29, 2017//
WI Court of Appeals – District I
Case Name: Milwaukee Police Association et al v. City of Milwaukee
Case No.: 2015AP2375
Officials: Kloppenburg, P.J, Sherman, and Blanchard, JJ.
Focus: Court Error – Ordinance Amendment
The Milwaukee Police Association and its President, Michael Crivello, and the Milwaukee Professional Firefighters Association, Local 215, and its President, David Seager, Jr., (collectively, “the Unions”), appeal a circuit court order granting summary judgment to the City of Milwaukee and denying the Police Association’s motion for summary judgment. The Unions argue that the court erred in dismissing their complaints. More specifically, the Unions argue that, in amending a City Charter ordinance affecting the “Annuity and Pension Board of the City of Milwaukee Employes’ Retirement System” (“the pension board”), the City violated the rights of retirement system members to maintain the existing size, composition, and manner of election of the pension board. Based on controlling precedent, Stoker v. Milwaukee County, 2014 WI 130, 359 Wis. 2d 347, 857 N.W.2d 102, we conclude that the City was entitled to amend the size, composition, and manner of election of the pension board on a prospective basis, as it did here, and therefore the circuit court properly dismissed the Unions’ complaints. Accordingly, we affirm