Judge allows state worker layoffs to stand

A judge has refused a union request to reinstate fired state workers and restrict how future layoffs can take place.

In an opinion made public Monday, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Andrew Klein said the evidence he has seen shows state agencies that engaged in massive layoffs “did their best to make informed, good faith decisions as to which employees had to be let go.’’

And Klein said the agencies, facing orders from the Legislature to cut spending, made the cuts in ways designed to save the most money.

Klein also upheld the decision by the state not to provide severance packages, including pay and health coverage, to those who were let go. He said the evidence shows there wasn’t the cash available to do that.

“It is hardly surprising that funding for such a program doesn’t exist,’’ Klein wrote. “If the state had such funds at its disposal, some of these layoffs probably could have been averted.’’

And Klein said that same lack of funds justifies not giving workers at least five days’ notice before being axed. In fact, the judge said, if additional notice had been given, “even more people would have lost their jobs.’’

The ruling is a major setback for the Service Employees International Union, which claims to represent about 17,000 state workers. Attorneys for the organization argued it was improper for the state to ignore its own rules in letting workers go.

Klein’s decision is technically not the end of the matter. He simply denied a request by the union to force the state to give these workers back their jobs while the legality of the layoffs is litigated.

But Klein said everything he has seen to date leads him to conclude that, even after a full-blown trial, the union is unlikely to win.

Scott Washburn, state director of the Service Employees International Union, said attorneys for the group are studying the ruling before deciding whether to proceed with the case.

Washburn said, though, his organization may be better off abandoning the lawsuit and concentrating on changing who runs the state.

“We don’t have a friend in the governor, we don’t have friends in the Legislature,’’ he said. Washburn said the ultimate solution would be to “change the political makeup’’ of state government.

“The people that are running it now are ideologically opposed to government,’’ Washburn said. “And the people that we represent work for government.’’

The lawsuit, filed in February, came after lawmakers cut $580 million in state spending as part of a plan to deal with a $1.6 billion deficit this budget year. To date, about 1,300 workers have been let go.

Union attorneys sought to halt further layoffs and have workers reinstated, claiming the state had not followed its own procedures.

Klein agreed there are rules dealing with things like advance notice and severance pay. But he said the depth of the state’s financial woes made following those procedures unworkable.

For example, he noted the testimony of Gale Garriott, director of the state Department of Revenue, where 216 workers were let go. Garriott said each week of delay in doing layoffs would have meant having to fire an additional 15 employees to make up the dollar difference.

“This not only qualifies as the type of emergency situation that justifies dispensing with the five days’ notice requirement, but it actually had the effect of saving jobs,’’ the judge wrote.

Klein also rejected arguments that the laid-off workers were entitled to some sort of hearing. He said such hearings are designed to give workers a chance to rebut the reasons being cited for their firing, something he said is irrelevant in a reduction-in-force action.