Union sues Madison schools over bus deal

By MARGIE TRAX PAGE - Staff Writer - mtrax@starbeacon.com
Star Beacon

July 31, 2008 03:04 am

— MADISON — Unrest over Madison Local School District’s privatization of student busing continues as the Ohio Association of Public School Employees (OAPSE) named the Madison school board in a civil lawsuit and has asked for an injunction on the private contract, union regional director Lloyd Rains said.
The lawsuit, which names former superintendent James J. Herrholtz, the current Interim Superintendent Matthew J. Chojnacki, Community Bus Service Inc. (CBS), and the State of Ohio, was filed Wednesday in Lake County Common Pleas Court, court records show.
“With the board unwilling to listen to the pleas of the community, community legislators and leaders, the union was left with no other choice but to pursue this legal avenue,” Rains said.
OAPSE filed an unfair labor practice charge with the Ohio State Employment Relations Board on Monday.
The uproar over bus privatization began last month when the Madison school board voted to hire Youngstown-based CBS over the OAPSE Local 238 members in order to save $300,000 per year for five years.
Rains said Herrholtz, who has since resigned from Madison and is now the superintendent of Richmond Heights schools, and the board were, “strategically manipulative,” and “knowingly used tactics to rid themselves of unwanted employees, their wages and benefits.”
Rains said he feels the school board — and Herrholtz in particular — set the transportation department up to fail by hiring inexperienced managers and allowing the bus garage to fall into disrepair.
The 32-page lawsuit also alleges the school district breached its collective bargaining agreement with OAPSE when it terminated the bus drivers and other transportation employees and calls the contract, “a civil conspiracy by secretly devising a scheme to hire CBS” and also claims the board used code words such as “Phase 2” and “Phase 3” to strike the deal in secret.
Herrholtz said the deal with CBS is sound and said the board made, “every reasonable attempt to work with the union.”
“In meetings we discussed changes to the transportation system to make it more efficient and proposals to save money. CBS guaranteed $1.5 million in savings over five years,” Herrholtz said. “Then the school board extended an invitation to (union) employees to meet that savings or at least get close.”
In the lawsuit, OAPSE alleges district officials refused to bargain in good faith and calls the deal with CBS “discrimination.”
Herrholtz said the board issued the all-or-nothing offer and got “a long-winded ‘no’ from the union.”
“Once we got that answer, it was pretty clear what we had to do,” Herrholtz said. “Basically there is no way for our district to walk away from this savings. We can’t afford not to privatize the busing given the answer we got from the union.”
Chojnacki couldn’t be reached for comment Wednesday.
Rains said the State of Ohio is named in the lawsuit because statutory provisions of 2006 provide no authority for privatization and calls the statutory provisions unconstitutional.
The civil lawsuit asks the court to void the district’s contract with CBS and seeks compensatory and punitive damages from the district, Herrholtz, Chojnacki, and CBS.
A motion for preliminary injunction will be heard at 8:30 a.m. Aug. 19, court records show.