Washington Public Sector Labor Negotiations Blog
Trends and Developments Concerning Washington Public Labor Contracts
By Jim Cline
Every arbitration contains lessons to apply to contract negotiations. Sometimes the lessons involve an extension of standards ways that arbitrators approach issues, and sometimes they involve unique situations or novel arguments on existing issues.
[Read more…]By Jim Cline
A long-delayed Island County Interest Arbitration has resulted in the Corrections Guild prevailing with a six-year wage award that, with year to year compounding, increased wages by 19.7%. The contract was delayed not just by lengthy arbitration and mediation, but also by a County Unfair Labor Practice that had resulted in canceling a scheduled 2019 hearing date. The Award covers contract years 2017 through 2022.
By Jim Cline and Troy Thornton
This is the second of two articles on recent Interest Arbitration decisions as part of our Annual Wage survey. A summary of all recent arbitrations since 2008 is available on the Premium website. This article covers a September 2020 decision by Arbitrator Jeffrey Jacobs involving the Washington State Fish & Wildlife Officers Guild (FWOG). While there were a few decisions last fall involving State employee bargaining units that are unique to those groups, this decision and the previously discussed Clark County decision are the only arbitration decisions involving public safety employee wage arbitration since the pandemic. (There is a November 2020 decision involving the Snohomish County corrections officers that only concerns their health insurance coverage.)
