Mandatory union fees banned for state employees
LANSING — In the wake of what one commissioner called a “tortured” Michigan Supreme Court decision, the state Civil Service Commission officially banned mandatory union fees for state employees.
Considering whether the state’s controversial right-to-work statutes applied to state workers, the Supreme Court ruled 4-3 on July 29 that the commission could not require employees covered by collective bargaining contracts to pay union dues or so-called “fair-share fees.” State workers already are covered by right-to-work policies through contract language, but the four commissioners voted unanimously Wednesday to update regulations to make union dues voluntary.
Commissioner Robert Swanson, the board’s only Democrat, said he was saddened to have to change rules based on a judicial opinion he called political and “one of the most tortured decisions” he’d ever read.
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He also said that, despite union officials’ fears, the court had crafted its decision narrowly to preserve a separation of powers between lawmakers and commissioners. The court did not rule right-to-work applies to state employees, Swanson argued, but “simply declared that we’ve been doing it wrong for 35 years” with the commission’s own rules requiring union payments.
The 2012 right-to-work law already applied to some public employees, but state-worker unions had argued only the commission — not the Legislature — could regulate the state government workforce. Republican Commissioner James Barrett noted Wednesday that rule change merely brought state workers in line with other Michiganders.
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In other business Wednesday, the commission lowered state-employee travel reimbursement rates from 39 cents per mile to 36 cents per mile to reflect lower fuel costs, approved a letter of understanding with the Michigan Corrections Organization dealing with mandatory overtime procedures, and updated the commission’s bylaws to codify longstanding practices.
Contact Justin A. Hinkley at (517) 377-1195 orjhinkley@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter@JustinHinkley.