HSTA’s rebuff of deal shut down talks, BOE member says

The state didn’t return to talks after the Hawaii State Teachers Association’s board unanimously rejected a "last, best and final" offer because union negotiators withdrew their support for the deal and the state believed it would have to restart discussions at square one, Board of Education member Jim Williams testified Wednesday.

Williams, testifying for hours at a Hawaii Labor Relations Board hearing, said the state’s team questioned whether HSTA bargained in good faith when union negotiators pledged on June 17 to urge their board to adopt the "last, best" offer, then voted against it along with the board a few days later. He also noted HSTA’s board rejected all elements of the offer, including items the union had introduced or already approved.

"Given that context, it was very hard for me to say we’ll go back and negotiate," he said.

Williams, part of the state’s team negotiating a new contract for teachers, is the first of scores of witnesses subpoenaed to testify in the union’s "prohibited practice" complaint.

HSTA argues the state violated members’ rights and the state Constitution when it unilaterally implemented its "last, best and final" offer July 1, imposing pay cuts, furloughs and larger shares of health insurance premiums for Hawaii’s 12,500 public school teachers.

The state says the "last, best" offer was needed to avert layoffs.

HSTA attorney Herbert Takahashi questioned Williams for more than four hours Wednesday, asking him about myriad issues that cropped up in negotiations, from drug testing to health insurance premiums. Williams, who was on the witness stand for three hours Tuesday, will testify again today and could be asked to return Friday.

The next witness is expected to be Board of Education Chairman Don Horner.

During his testimony, Williams said that once the union voted against the "last, best" contract offer, there was no movement by the state’s team to return to negotiations, though the union asked numerous times for bargaining sessions to start up again.

"Once it was rejected, it was rejected," Williams said, adding that the governor has since expressed interest in entering mediation with HSTA. (The union has said it wants mediation and binding arbitration, something the state is not interested in).

When asked by Takahashi on Wednesday whether he thought HSTA’s rejection of the final offer meant "you had to start over," Williams said he did. He added that the union didn’t offered any counterproposals when it rejected the final offer.

Also Wednesday, Williams said that a letter to members indicating the state’s plan to unilaterally implement the final offer was drafted before the union rejected the proposal. He said he alerted HSTA such a letter was being drawn up, but told them "they shouldn’t be disturbed" and added the letter would be withdrawn when an offer was approved.

Meanwhile this week, both sides — along with the University of Hawaii Professional Assembly, which is acting as an intervenor in the case — filed their opinions with the labor board on the question of whether the teachers union has the right to strike.

The labor board is expected to take up the question, though it’s unclear when.

The union argues it cannot strike because of several pending prohibited practice complaints before the labor board. In a filing with the board, Takahashi argued that a "plain reading" of the law appears to condition the right to strike on exhausting all "procedures available for the prevention of prohibited practices if there is an impasse."

The state also interprets the law as precluding the right to strike if there is a prohibited practice complaint before the labor board that is germane to the dispute between the sides. It said that HSTA’s complaint on the imposed contract falls within that definition.

The University of Hawaii Professional Assembly disagrees that HSTA cannot strike. The UHPA said in its filing that it might in the future argue with the state’s decision to unilaterally implement a contract, however, "to preserve the balance of the law, if an employer can implement its last best and final offer, then certainly, as of the moment of implementation, the union has the right to strike."