THE STATE EX REL. CASEY ET AL., APPELLANTS, v. BROWN, MAYOR, ET AL., APPELLEES.
No. 2022-1178
Supreme Court of Ohio
Decided July 6, 2023
172 Ohio St.3d 655, 2023-Ohio-2264
Submitted March 21, 2023. APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Mahoning County, No. 22 MA 0003, 2022-Ohio-2843.
Mandamus—Labor relations—Fire-department captain seeking promotion had adequate remedy in ordinary course of law to advance his grievance by way of collective-bargaining agreement between city and his union because his claim was grievable—Court of appeals’ dismissal of complaint under
(No. 2022-1178—Submitted March 21, 2023—Decided July 6, 2023.)
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Mahoning County, No. 22 MA 0003, 2022-Ohio-2843.
Per Curiam.
{¶ 1} This is a direct appeal from a judgment of the Seventh District Court of Appeals dismissing a complaint for a writ of mandamus filed by appellant John M. Casey against appellees, Youngstown Mayor Jamael Tito Brown, Youngstown Fire Chief Barry Finley, and Youngstown Finance Director Kyle Miasek (collectively, “the officials”). Casey sought an order directing the officials to promote him to the rank of battalion chief in the Youngstown Fire Department and to award him associated compensation and employment benefits accruing from the promotion. Casey also sought awards of attorney fees and costs. The court of appeals dismissed the complaint, reasoning that Casey had an adequate remedy in the ordinary course of the law. We affirm.
A. Events leading up to and relating to Casey’s grievance
{¶ 2} Casey is a captain in the city’s fire department and a member of Youngstown Professional Fire Fighters Local 312 (“the union”). The city and the union are signatories to a collective-bargaining agreement (“CBA”) that governs Casey’s employment.
{¶ 3} Part of the background underlying Casey’s complaint relates to the city’s handling of three battalion-chief positions. In October 2019, the State Employment Relations Board (“SERB”) found that there was probable cause to support an unfair-labor-practice charge brought by the union regarding the city’s threatened elimination of the positions. The city later eliminated the positions.
{¶ 4} In January 2020, the Mahoning County Court of Common Pleas issued an order granting SERB’s request for an injunction to prevent the city from eliminating the positions while SERB investigated the charge. In June 2020, the trial court held the city in contempt for violating the terms of the injunction and, as a means of purging the contempt, ordered the city to promote a qualified candidate to fill a vacant battalion-chief position. The city appealed the contempt order, and the court of appeals affirmed. State Emp. Relations Bd. v. Youngstown, 7th Dist. Mahoning No. 20 MA 0060, 2021-Ohio-4552 (“Youngstown I”).
{¶ 5} Meanwhile, SERB carried on with its investigation and, in June 2020, determined that the city had committed an unfair labor practice by eliminating the three positions. SERB ordered the city to, among other things, reconstitute the abolished positions. The city appealed SERB’s order to the trial court, which affirmed. On appeal, the court of appeals affirmed the trial court’s judgment. Youngstown v. State Emp. Relations Bd., 2021-Ohio-4591, 182 N.E.3d 436 (7th Dist.) (“Youngstown II”).
{¶ 6} In June 2021, a battalion-chief vacancy arose upon an individual’s retirement. Casey thereafter sat for a promotional examination and finished,
{¶ 7} In October 2021, Casey and the union filed a grievance against the city pursuant to “Step 2” of the CBA, which directs an aggrieved employee to submit a written grievance to the fire chief or his authorized representative. Casey’s grievance asserted that the city had violated Article 13, Section 1 of the CBA, which provides that “[a]fter the list has been certified to the appointing authority, the employee ranking highest on the applicable list shall be appointed within fourteen (14) days.” Unsatisfied with the outcome at Step 2, Casey advanced his grievance pursuant to “Step 3” of the CBA, which requires the mayor’s designee to either grant the employee’s requested remedy, deny the grievance, or hold a hearing within 14 days. If a hearing is held, the CBA requires that the grievance be decided within ten days after the hearing.
{¶ 8} During the early stages of the Step 3 proceedings, the court of appeals had not yet issued its decisions in Youngstown I and Youngstown II. Thus, on December 10, 2021, the mayor’s designee issued a preliminary decision explaining that he was holding a decision on Casey’s grievance in abeyance pending the outcomes of those cases. The court of appeals decided Youngstown I and Youngstown II three days later.
{¶ 9} On January 5, 2022, Casey asked the union president and other officials whether they planned to advance his grievance to arbitration under “Step 4” of the CBA given that the court of appeals in Youngstown II had upheld the trial court’s affirmance of SERB’s order directing the city to reconstitute the three battalion-chief positions. The union president advised Casey that the union could not commit to advancing his grievance to arbitration, because the union had already committed to prosecuting the grievance of another union member who contended that she had been wrongly denied an opportunity to sit for the promotional
{¶ 10} On January 11, 2022, the mayor’s designee issued a “supplemental decision.” Although the designee noted that he had received copies of the decisions in Youngstown I and Youngstown II, he concluded that he still could not proceed to a determination on the merits, because the arbitrator had not yet issued a decision in the matter involving the other union member. In the designee’s view, “the issues under review in [that] arbitration [we]re such that an award involving those issues could potentially have a direct and substantive effect on the ability of the City to grant the requested remedy in John Casey’s grievance.” The designee thus held his decision in further abeyance pending the outcome of the other union member’s arbitration proceeding. Later that month, the arbitrator ordered the city to allow the other union member to sit for the promotional examination after determining that she should have been allowed to take it.
{¶ 11} In February 2022, the mayor’s designee denied Casey’s grievance, and the union thereafter advised Casey that it would not seek arbitration of the designee’s decision pursuant to Step 4 of the CBA.
B. Seventh District proceedings
{¶ 12} In January 2022, Casey filed a complaint (later amended in March 2022) in the court of appeals requesting a writ of mandamus ordering the officials to promote him to battalion chief and remit to him all additional compensation and employment benefits that would have accrued to him had he been timely promoted to battalion chief. Casey alleged that such compensation and benefits began to accrue as of October 19, 2021, which is two weeks after the civil-service commission mailed the results of the promotional examination that Casey took. Casey named the city as an additional relator based on
{¶ 14} Casey then filed this appeal. During the appeal’s pendency, Casey filed a motion to strike aspects of the officials’ brief and a motion for oral argument.
II. ANALYSIS
{¶ 15} This court reviews de novo a court of appeals’ judgment dismissing a mandamus complaint under
{¶ 16} Casey’s principal argument on appeal is that the court of appeals erred in determining that the CBA (and the effect a court must give it under
A. Motions
1. Motion to strike
{¶ 17} Casey has filed a motion to strike, arguing that the appendix attached to the officials’ merit brief, which refers to nine exhibits, improperly contains materials that are either duplicative or outside the record. Casey also seeks to strike the officials’ merit brief to the extent that it refers to these exhibits. Last, Casey argues that the officials’ reference in their merit brief to Article 56 of the CBA should be stricken because the record does not contain Article 56. We grant the motion in part and deny it in part.
{¶ 18} Because this appeal is before us upon the court of appeals’ judgment granting a motion to dismiss under
{¶ 19} The table of contents of the officials’ merit brief identifies a copy of the CBA as exhibit No. 1. But the officials failed to attach the document to their merit brief, so there is nothing to strike.
{¶ 20} Exhibit No. 2 contains a copy of Casey’s Step 2 grievance, which he attached to his complaint. Casey is not prejudiced by the officials’ inclusion and discussion of a document that he himself attached to his complaint. Even so, exhibit No. 2 also contains Chief Finley’s response, which Casey did not attach to his complaint. We therefore strike the chief’s response and the officials’ reference to it in their merit brief.
{¶ 21} Exhibit No. 3 contains a copy of Casey’s Step 3 grievance and Chief Finley’s response to Casey’s Step 2 grievance. Because neither document was attached to Casey’s complaint, we strike the documents and the officials’ references to them.
{¶ 22} Exhibit No. 4 contains a copy of the February 2022 decision issued by the mayor’s designee denying Casey’s grievance. Because the document was not attached to Casey’s complaint, we strike it and the officials’ references to it. The exhibit also contains copies of the decisions the designee issued in December 2021 and January 2022. Because these latter two decisions were attached to Casey’s complaint, he is not prejudiced by the officials’ submission and discussion of them on appeal.
{¶ 23} Exhibit No. 5 is a copy of a February 2022 letter of understanding that addresses the nullification of a civil-service promotional list. Because this document was not attached to Casey’s complaint, we strike it and the officials’ references to it.
{¶ 25} Exhibit No. 7 is a copy of a Step 2 grievance filed by another member of Casey’s union. Because this document was not attached to Casey’s complaint, we strike it and the officials’ reference to it.
{¶ 26} Exhibit No. 8 appears to be a copy of Chief Finley’s response to the grievance submitted as Exhibit No. 7. Because this document was not attached to Casey’s complaint, we strike it and the officials’ reference to it.
{¶ 27} Exhibit No. 9 is a May 2021 letter issued by the city’s director of law regarding the handling of promotional examinations. Because this document was not attached to Casey’s complaint, we strike it and the officials’ reference to it.
{¶ 28} Last, Article 56 of the CBA, which the officials’ merit brief refers to, was not attached to Casey’s complaint. We therefore strike the officials’ references to it.
2. Motion for oral argument
{¶ 29} Casey also requests that we schedule the matter for oral argument. “Oral argument in a direct appeal is discretionary.” State ex rel. Scott v. Streetsboro, 150 Ohio St.3d 1, 2016-Ohio-3308, 78 N.E.3d 809, ¶ 9, citing
{¶ 30} Casey says that oral argument is warranted here because “[a] ruling in this case will have far-reaching ramifications for thousands upon thousands of bargaining unit employees in the public sector in Ohio.” But he cites nothing to back up this statement. Nor is there a substantial constitutional question at issue.
B. Casey had an adequate, albeit unsuccessfully invoked, remedy at law by way of the CBA’s grievance procedure
{¶ 31} The enactment of “
{¶ 32} Relevant here is
An agreement between a public employer and an exclusive representative entered into pursuant to [
R.C. Chapter 4117 ] governs the wages, hours, and terms and conditions of public employment covered by the agreement. If the agreement provides for a final andbinding arbitration of grievances, public employers, employees, and employee organizations are subject solely to that grievance procedure and the state personnel board of review or civil service commissions have no jurisdiction to receive and determine any appeals relating to matters that were the subject of a final and binding grievance procedure. Where no agreement exists or where an agreement makes no specification about a matter, the public employer and public employees are subject to all applicable state or local laws or ordinances pertaining to the wages, hours, and terms and conditions of employment for public employees.
{¶ 33} “By providing that the contract governs conditions of employment, the General Assembly has indicated its preference for enforcing those terms of an agreement which were arrived at through open negotiation at the bargaining table, regardless of which party is advantaged.” State ex rel. Rollins v. Cleveland Hts.-University Hts. City School Dist. Bd. of Edn., 40 Ohio St.3d 123, 127, 532 N.E.2d 1289 (1988) (construing
{¶ 34} In State ex rel. Walker v. Lancaster City School Dist. Bd. of Edn., 79 Ohio St.3d 216, 680 N.E.2d 993 (1997), this court considered whether an agreement between a substitute teacher’s union and her public employer provided her with an adequate legal remedy to redress her claims concerning calculation of service credit and revocation of previously granted service credit. In doing so, we observed that a “grievance and arbitration procedure in a collective bargaining agreement generally provides an adequate legal remedy, which precludes extraordinary relief in mandamus, when violations of the agreement are alleged by a person who is a member of the bargaining unit covered by the agreement.” Id. at 218. But “[i]n
{¶ 35} Because a “collective bargaining agreement is a contract,” State ex rel. Kabert v. Shaker Hts. City School Dist. Bd. of Edn., 78 Ohio St.3d 37, 44, 676 N.E.2d 101 (1997), we must look to the terms of the CBA to determine whether Casey had a grievable issue, Shifrin v. Forest City Ents., Inc., 64 Ohio St.3d 635, 638, 597 N.E.2d 499 (1992) (“Generally, courts presume that the intent of the parties to a contract resides in the language they chose to employ in the agreement”). If the CBA’s terms are “clear and unambiguous, they should be applied as written,” Sutton Bank v. Progressive Polymers, L.L.C., 161 Ohio St.3d 387, 2020-Ohio-5101, 163 N.E.3d 546, ¶ 18.
{¶ 36} The two CBA articles that Casey has invoked are titled “GRIEVANCE AND ARBITRATION” (Article 10) and “PROMOTIONS” (Article 13). (Capitalization and boldface sic.) Article 10, Section 1 provides that “[a] grievance is any dispute between an employee and the City or its representative involving an allegation that there has been a breach, misrepresentation, or improper application of this Agreement.” Article 10, Section 3 provides that the grievance process constitutes a “final and binding” procedure as defined in
{¶ 37} Regarding promotions, Article 13, Section 1 provides:
Whenever the City determines that a vacancy in the promotional ranks exists, a request for promotional appointment or a promotional examination, as applicable, will be submitted to the Civil Service Commission within fourteen (14) calendar days of such determination. After the list has been certified to the appointing authority, the employee ranking highest on the applicable list shall be appointed within fourteen (14) days.
{¶ 38} In this case, Casey’s amended complaint alleges that because the civil-service commission scheduled a promotional exam, the city must have determined that a vacancy in the promotional ranks existed. He next alleges that he placed atop the eligibility list, triggering the city’s duty to promote him within 14 days. These allegations bring him squarely within Article 13, Section 1, for they point to a dispute about how the CBA was applied. They also establish that unlike the teacher in Walker, 79 Ohio St.3d at 218, Casey had a grievable issue controlled by the CBA’s grievance procedure because a failure to promote in accordance with Article 13, Section 1 would constitute a “breach, misrepresentation, or improper application of th[e] [CBA]” under Article 10, Section 1.
{¶ 39} Casey himself came to a similar conclusion when he filed his grievance at Step 2, asserting that the city’s failure to promote him violated Article
{¶ 40} In summary, Casey had an adequate remedy in the ordinary course of the law to advance his grievance by way of the CBA because his claim was grievable. See Walker at 218 (observing that the “grievance and arbitration procedure in a collective bargaining agreement generally provides an adequate legal remedy, which precludes extraordinary relief in mandamus, when violations of the agreement are alleged by a person who is a member of the bargaining unit covered by the agreement”).
C. Casey’s counterarguments
{¶ 41} Casey advances two main arguments against this conclusion. We find neither persuasive.
1. The CBA and R.C. Chapter 4117
{¶ 42} Casey first asserts that it is wrong to confine the analysis to the interplay between the CBA and
{¶ 43} Broadly speaking,
{¶ 44} To support his no-conflict argument, Casey points to
{¶ 45} Casey also argues that he “did not bring an action in the Seventh Appellate Judicial District that was dependent in any way on finding that City officials failed to meet th[e] 14-day deadline.” (Emphasis sic.) His complaint belies this assertion. There, in his claim for relief, he conveys that he became entitled to the rank of battalion chief and to associated employment benefits “not later than October 19, 2021.” That date is significant because it is 14 days after October 5, 2021, and Casey alleges that the civil-service commission completed its certification on or about October 5, 2021.
{¶ 46} Even if Casey is right that the conflict is immaterial, he still has not shown why this court should ignore the language of the CBA. Casey says that “when it comes to the actual act of promoting [him], Article 13 of the [CBA] in the main is superfluous or cumulative” to
{¶ 47} Our decision in Tapo v. Columbus Bd. of Edn., 31 Ohio St.3d 105, 509 N.E.2d 419 (1987), on which Casey relies, is not to the contrary. In that case, two teachers sued in common pleas court, alleging that the school board had breached its employment contracts with them by failing to place them on higher salary schedules. This court rejected the board’s argument that the teachers had to submit their claims through the grievance and arbitration procedures under their collective-bargaining agreements, because the board had earlier stipulated that the teachers were entitled to a higher rate of pay. Id. at 107. There is no such stipulation here. See State ex rel. Johnson v. Cleveland Hts./Univ. Hts. School Dist. Bd. of Edn., 73 Ohio St.3d 189, 193, 652 N.E.2d 750 (1995) (distinguishing Tapo on this basis).
{¶ 48} Casey’s reliance on State ex rel. Rootstown Local School Dist. Bd. of Edn. v. Portage Cty. Court of Common Pleas, 78 Ohio St.3d 489, 678 N.E.2d 1365 (1997), fares no better. In that case, we held that “[i]f a party asserts rights that are independent of
2. The efficacy of the CBA
{¶ 49} Casey also argues that although the CBA’s grievance procedure initially provided him with an adequate remedy in the ordinary course of the law, the “remedy evaporated the moment the Union abandoned [his] grievance and declined to take it to arbitration.” (Emphasis sic.) After the union “abandoned” him, Casey says, he “no longer had any remedy through the [CBA] and lacked any means of compelling arbitration.” (Emphasis sic.) Casey posits that if his grievance had been submitted to arbitration, then he would have had “no business” bringing this mandamus action.
{¶ 50} Casey’s argument is internally inconsistent. On the one hand, he concedes that so long as he was able to seek relief through the CBA’s grievance procedure, his remedy under the CBA was adequate. But, the argument runs, once he received an unfavorable decision by way of the union president’s decision to decline to advance his grievance to arbitration, the remedy became inadequate, clearing the way for this action. It follows that if his remedy was at one time adequate—as he concedes that it was—then that is enough.
{¶ 51} Under Casey’s logic, grievants who do not prevail could circumvent the processes prescribed by a collective-bargaining agreement. See State ex rel. Nichols v. Cuyahoga Cty. Bd. of Mental Retardation & Dev. Disabilities, 72 Ohio St.3d 205, 209, 648 N.E.2d 823 (1995). Moreover, the mere fact that a remedy yields an unfavorable result does not render it inadequate. Id. And besides, as the court of appeals noted, if Casey felt that the union had treated him unfairly by abandoning him rather than advancing his grievance to arbitration, then he could have pursued an unfair-labor-practice charge before SERB under
{¶ 53} Casey asserts that the remedy afforded by the CBA is not beneficial or complete, because under its terms, the union president can unilaterally decide whether to advance his grievance to arbitration. But this is just a repackaging of his arguments discussed above. In faulting the CBA for its lack of speediness, he claims that he has been entitled to a promotion since at least October 19, 2021. But the mere fact that Casey has been awaiting a promotion he believes he is entitled to says nothing about the speediness of the procedures prescribed by the CBA for evaluating whether he is, in fact, entitled to that promotion. Moreover, the proceedings under the CBA lasted from October 2021, when he filed his grievance, to February 2022, when the mayor’s designee denied his grievance and the union president thereafter informed him that his grievance would not be advanced to arbitration. This time lapse does not vitiate the remedy’s adequacy. See State ex rel. Roush v. Montgomery, 156 Ohio St.3d 351, 2019-Ohio-932, 126 N.E.3d 1118, ¶ 12 (“the mere fact that [an] appeal itself takes time [does not] establish its inadequacy”).
III. CONCLUSION
{¶ 54} The judgment of the court of appeals is affirmed. Casey’s motion to strike is granted in part and denied in part, and his motion for oral argument is denied.
Judgment affirmed.
KENNEDY, C.J., and FISCHER, DEWINE, DONNELLY, STEWART, BRUNNER, and DETERS, JJ., concur.
Law Offices of S. David Worhatch and S. David Worhatch, for appellants, John M. Casey and city of Youngstown.
Jeff Limbian, Youngstown Law Director, and Daniel P. Dascenzo, Deputy Director, for appellees.