All –
The town crank has proposed the following motion for my town meeting.
Is this legal? I get that the town budget can be approved or rejected, but can they eliminate funding for everything except the contract?
I move to eliminate all proposed funding in Article 18 for the sub total line on page 52 under the heading EDUCATION, Line item, School Budget and subtotal in amount of $36,847,861 or _________________________, as it presently contains initial funding for a “Proposed Contract” entitled “AGREEMENT between the NORTH ANDOVER SCHOOL COMMITTEE and the NORTH ANDOVER TEACHERS UNION 2011 – 2014, made and entered into as of September 1, 2011 for the period September 1, 2011 to August 31, 2014, and by doing so, have North Andover’s 2011 Annual Town Meeting refuse to give required legislative approval BY PROVIDING INITIAL FUNDING for Proposed Contract and prevent its provisions and any other labor contracts contained in the amount therein from becoming effective and binding on the Town of North Andover.
MOTION TO PUT IN NEW LINE ITEM ENTITLED “TOWN MEETING’S N A PUBLIC SCHOOLS”.
I move to create a new line item in Article 18 entitled TOWN MEETING’S, N A PUBLIC SCHOOLS in the amount of $36,847,860 (or __________________________) with a corresponding sub-total in the same amount and to have Town Meeting affirm that this line item and subtotal do not contain any initial funding for any new proposed labor contracts previously rejected by Town Meeting and sent back for collective bargaining
If I read the motion right, this person is proposing that the town not fund an agreed-upon, ratified contract?
I’m no lawyer, but my understanding is that contracts are legal documents. You can fund it now, or vote to not fund it, pay a lawyer a ton of money to lose a court case, and pay later.
I believe it is legal. Our school committee voted not to fully fund a contract (with a vendor) last year, and the contract thus is broken and renegotiated.
I would personally never try that with employees.
(1) it would depend on the language of the warrant and (2) is likely a bad idea.
Sab, I think the law on contracts, executed or not, is that Town Meeting is the appropriating body and no other parts of Town government may claim that power by signing a contract (except the school committee for school contracts). So if the contract is not explicitly contingent on appropriation it is implicitly so.
The remedy is that the contract is void and the status quo ante obtains. As tracynovick says, this is not likely to end well were it to pass. Town Meeting is not in a position to do a good job negotiating a contact.
The motion failed. There was a difference of legal opinion on whether or not the motion was legal, but the moderator decided to let it go to a vote anyway. The crank had an opinion that said that Town Meeting could reject the contract by rejecting the budget amounts. Town labor counsel said that the union would be liable to sue.
What is scary is that we all got emails at 6:30 advising us of this motion. I would have tag-teamed the meeting with my wife, but we ended up having my mother-in-law come over. It could have happened at 11:30 pm with few people around. Never let your guard down, I guess.