The St. Thomas chapter of the International Association of Firefighters filed Friday to join a lawsuit challenging the 8-percent salary cut recently signed into law by Gov. John deJongh Jr. to forestall mass layoffs due to fiscal constraints.
On Aug. 25, U.S. District Judge Raymond Finch consolidated lawsuits filed in St. Croix by the St. Croix Police Benevolent Association, the Law Enforcement Supervisors Union Local 119 and the St. Croix Federation of Teachers, moving them to St. Thomas.
Two days later, U.S. District Court Judge Curtis Gomez consolidated those cases together with suits filed by the United Steelworkers, the St. Thomas Federation of Teachers, the V.I. State Nurses Association and the Seafarers International Union.
All seven plaintiffs argue the pay-cut act, aka the Economic Stability Act (ESA), violates the U.S. Revised Organic Act of 1954’s requirement that no law impair otherwise binding contracts because the pay cuts violate the unions’ collective bargaining agreements.
Several suits argue, too, the act was enacted improperly because it was not presented by the governor to the Legislature, citing passages of the organic act (the territory’s equivalent to a constitution until there is such a document) that requires the governor to submit an annual budget and the Legislature to act upon the budget.
Gomez denied the unions’ request for a temporary restraining order (TRO) against the pay cuts on Friday, the same day the St. Thomas firefighters filed suit. The firefighters and some of the other unions are now pushing for a preliminary injunction, instead. A TRO is usually sought during the interim while awaiting a ruling on a preliminary injunction.
The firefighters are also arguing early retirement incentives in the ESA violate the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution because they say it reduces—by an extra 3 percent, for an 11-percent pay cut—the pay of employees eligible for retirement who choose not to retire.
This objection refers to a passage in the ESA saying "any member of the GERS who has attained 30 or more years of credited service … shall pay an additional 3 percent of their salary into GERS effective Oct. 1, 2011."
Judge Gomez has been meeting with the litigants in chambers. No trial date had been formally scheduled with the federal court system as of Tuesday evening and Gomez has yet to issue any orders or opinions on the merits of the various filings and counter filings.
