Way Cleared For Collective Bargaining Election Judge’S Decision Gives City Workers Chance To Establish Rights In Special Election On Feb. 2

The special election must be held.

City workers will have the chance to re-establish their collective bargaining rights in a special election Feb. 2, District Judge Gary Haman ruled Monday.

Haman dismissed an injunction he granted in late November that would have delayed the election on the ballot initiative until at least May.

“I’m convinced (courts) have no business interfering,” Haman said after listening to arguments from attorneys for the Lake City Employees Association, the Coeur d’Alene Police Officers Association and the mayor and City Council.

Idaho law clearly calls for the courts to stay out of the fight over whether the initiative is legal until voters approve the measure, Haman said. If the voters reject a measure, such arguments don’t apply.

But that viewpoint wasn’t available at the November hearing because Lake City Employees were not notified of the hearing.

“I was in somewhat of a quandary last time around. … There was nobody to give any opposition,” Haman said of his November ruling.

City workers are ecstatic.

“I think it’s a very positive step for employees and citizens who both are eventually going to benefit from collective bargaining,” said Dan Dixon, president of the Police Officers Association. When police officers know they have a say in working conditions and wages, “it attracts better-quality officers,” he said.

Nancy Sue Wallace, president of the City Council, said the council hasn’t yet seen the ruling.

“I’m sure we will be discussing it during executive session” tonight, Wallace said. “We are going to look at our options.”

During the hearing, Dudley Forster, who represented city officials, argued that the city would suffer irreparable harm - the cost of a special election - if the February polling went forward. Better to wait until the city can thoroughly research and fully pursue its case against the initiative, he said.

That would have delayed the special election until May, but that would not have hurt the city workers, Forster said.

The city has estimated the cost of the election at $12,000.

Attorney Scott Reed, who represented city workers and police officers, cited two key Idaho Supreme Court decisions in arguing the courts had no basis to stop the February election. Those decisions dealt with pre-election challenges to an initiative establishing an Idaho lottery and to the property-tax-limiting 1 percent initiative.

In both cases the state high court ruled “for a court to cause a postponement would be to interfere with the political process,” Reed argued. “We are entitled to have the election on the date we picked. There’s no basis for stopping it.”

Haman agreed.

But it is unlikely this is the last word on collective bargaining for city workers as both sides prepare to campaign on the measure.

Last March, the City Council repealed a 16-year ordinance that gave city employees, including police officers, the right to collective bargaining. That prompted the workers to gather more than enough signatures to put a collective bargaining initiative on the ballot.

They narrowly missed getting the measure on the November ballot, prompting the special election.

Firefighters continue to have the right to collective bargaining. Their right is guaranteed by state law.