final decision

Voters in the Northern California city of Vallejo passed a ballot measure adopting binding arbitration with its public employee unions more than 50 years ago, following a bitter police strike.

The goal was labor peace. Under binding arbitration, an independent referee is brought in when negotiators hit an impasse. The final decision on wages, benefits and working conditions is taken out of the hands of the local elected officials and placed squarely with the arbitrator.

With Measure A on the Nov. 3 ballot, Los Angeles County voters have a chance to do much the same thing here.

The measure is being pushed by unions representing county firefighters, sheriff’s deputies and other public safety employees who by law cannot go out on strike, and who say binding arbitration adds balance to the negotiation process by taking away the unilateral authority held by the county Board of Supervisors.

No formal opposition to Measure A has been submitted. But in his summary of the potential impact this year, county chief executive Joe Nicchita shared news stories showing how binding arbitration has played out in other jurisdictions, including Vallejo.

In 2007, a mediator determined that despite fiscal travails, Vallejo couldn’t reduce the size of its fire department. Eight months later, with little budgetary wiggle room, the city declared bankruptcy.

Vallejo had been the first California municipality to adopt binding arbitration. In 2010, the voters decided to ditch it.

Supervisor Holly Mitchell voiced concerns about Measure A when the board discussed placing it on the ballot this year.

“Arbitrators aren’t elected,” she said. “They’re not required to weigh countywide trade-offs like homeless services, like healthcare, capital improvements, all those things.”

The board voted 4-0 to place binding arbitration on the Nov. 3 ballot, with Mitchell abstaining. Supporters say there are sufficient protections to prevent the county from experiencing the financial tribulations that Vallejo and other cities suffered in part because of binding arbitration.

“This process opens up the books, allows the parties to come together and base decisions on facts rather than political preferences, and it also shows whether there are actually resources to meet the demands that are coming,” Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, an architect of the measure, said in an interview.

Horvath previously noted that just six of the 21 jurisdictions in California that have instituted binding arbitration, including two counties, have had to resort to it.

If a majority of county voters approves Charter Amendment A, it will cover 14 bargaining units representing some 16,500 county workers, among them lifeguards and deputy medical examiners. It would not apply to bargaining units whose workers can strike.

In the current system, if the sides are unable to reach an agreement, the supervisors can impose a final offer that the unions must accept. While contract negotiations are frequently contentious, historically the supervisors mandating final terms is rare; The Times previously reported that it has happened only twice since 2001.

Under the proposed measure, contract negotiations would begin as they do now, with the presumption that both sides bargain in good faith. However, if agreement proves impossible and an impasse is declared, a three-member arbitration panel would take over.

In that case, the county and the union each would select one member, with the sides together choosing the third person, who would serve as the panel’s chair. The arbitrators would hold hearings and weigh evidence related to employment elements such as wages and hours. In the end, the binding ruling would be made public.

Derek Hsieh, executive director of the Assn. for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs, said the current process began with a group of labor unions launching a signature-gathering drive to put binding arbitration before voters. That led to working with the supervisors and the county chief executive, who, Hsieh said, wanted to ensure there were certain safeguards.

Hsieh said binding arbitration would represent an important and balanced change.

“Currently, the employer has near unilateral control over what the contract provisions are,” he said.

He added that the threat of going before arbitrators would spur both county and union negotiators to reach an agreement before someone else takes over, and that it would prevent either side from pushing a “wild proposal” that arbitrators would quickly reject.

Dave Gillotte, president of the International Assn. of Firefighters Local 1014, which represents more than 3,000 L.A. County Fire Department employees, agrees that the very threat of winding up in binding arbitration would encourage negotiating teams to cut a deal.

“Binding arbitration really brings about leverage to move both parties to work hard to get a contract done, where we don’t have that now,” Gillotte said.

The practice of using binding arbitration to resolve union and government disputes has been around for decades.

“These are routine laws that are part of the labor relations framework,” said Justin McBride of the UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment.

The strong union support for binding arbitration would seem to suggest that the process favors organized labor over elected local governments. McBride said academic studies don’t support that premise, and that neither side overwhelmingly comes out on top.

He pointed to a 2010 study from Cornell University that examined decades of negotiation outcomes in New York. One finding was that after a few years, the number of cases that wound up in arbitration declined, indicating that the sides learned to work together.

“Everyone gets a deal, and just like in a lot of contracts maybe both parties aren’t 100% with it, but that’s kind of the nature of collective bargaining,” McBride said.

Still, there have been instances in which decisions by independent arbitrators contributed to a municipality’s economic challenges, and elected officials were unable to unwind the rulings.

In her interview with The Times, Horvath said arbitrators would be expected to make decisions that consider the county’s fiscal situation.

“That’s what this is designed to do,” she said.

While no formal opponents to Measure A are listed on the ballot, some progressive groups aren’t on board. The voter guides for community organization L.A. Forward and prison abolition proponents La Defensa both urge a “no” vote. The inclusion of the Sheriff’s Department influenced that decision.

“We believe law enforcement special interest groups should not be treated as labor or given more leverage in negotiations,” La Defensa wrote in its guide. “More money and more power for the Sheriff’s Department is the crux of our opposition. By bundling deputies with firefighters and lifeguards, Measure A weaponizes a process we would otherwise support.”

Labor unions and other supporters are digging deep. The unions representing sheriff’s deputies, firefighters and other employee groups reported raising $7.7 million through mid-October to campaign in favor of Measure A, according to financial disclosure reports.

No campaign funds have been reported in opposition to Measure A.