Give labor board resources it needs

Hawaii law requires that the three-person board deciding public employee labor disagreements involving the county and state governments "execute all of its responsibilities in a timely manner," but that has become next to impossible because of cutbacks in the board’s staff. The Legislature is considering deadlines for deciding cases, but the only sensible approach is to provide a large enough staff to address cases over a punctual timetable.

The Hawaii Labor Relations Board is required by law to schedule hearings about a dispute within 40 days; its decision is to be made "promptly" after the final hearing. However, nearly 10 months after the board’s final hearing of the Hawaii State Teachers Association’s complaint about Gov. Neil Abercrombie’s "last, best and final" contract offer imposed in July 2011, the board has yet to arrive at a decision in the heated case.

Wil Okabe, the teachers union’s president, complained to state legislators that the board "stated it has the discretion to respond when it’s good and ready," which is legally true. When the union complained to the state Supreme Court, the labor board responded that "it has the discretion to take as long as it wants, possibly years," Okabe pointed out, since it has no timetable. For a second time, the high court last month denied the union’s bid to compel a speedy resolution.

Labor board member Sesnita Moepono explained to a House committee in writing — no one had time to show up at the Capitol during work hours, she suggested — that the board is severely understaffed. Two lawyers and one paralegal were cut from the staff in 1997, leaving the board since then with an executive officer (a lawyer), a secretary and a legal stenographer. While faced with about 75 cases a year, the board’s caseload has risen in the past year by 30 cases to 127, she said.

"There’s no cushion," Moepono told the Star-Advertiser’s Nanea Kalani. "For example, we don’t hire court reporters because we just don’t have the money. We tape our hearings and have to refer back to the audio when drafting decisions."

A bill proposed by the teachers union before the Legislature with the support of other public employee unions would require the labor board to resolve any complaint within 30 days — or 90 days in a later version — of the filing date or be ruled in favor of the complainant. While that frustration-induced push is understandable, the result it seeks is unrealistic under present conditions.

The Abercrombie administration rightly opposes "any arbitrary, pre-determined time limit" in a case that "can be complex and detailed." Likewise, schools Superintendent Kathryn S. Matayoshi explained that "flexibility" is necessary in complex cases.

Fortunately, House and Senate labor committee chairmen understand that adding staff to the labor board is the most logical way to deal with the overflow of cases before what Moepono describes now as "a skeleton crew and bare-bones budget."

In the House, Chairman Mark Nakashima proposes a budget for a legal staff member and Senate Chairman Clayton Hee says he will propose two new staff attorneys.

The reason for the cutbacks is not clear, but the prolonged dispute between the teachers union and the Abercrombie administration over contract issues is an important catalyst for restoration of fuller staff to ease the logjam of labor disputes.