UFT Letter to City Council on ECB

Council Member Simcha Felder
Chair, Committee on Governmental Operations
NY City Council
250 Broadway—17th floor
New York, NY 10007

Council Member David Yassky
Chair, Committee on Small Business
NY City Council
250 Broadway—18th floor
New York, NY 10007

June 19, 2008


Dear Chairpersons Yassky and Felder:

As you may be aware, all of the per diem Administrative Law Judges of
the ECB are now represented by the United Federation of Teachers, after last summer’s landslide vote of 221 - 7 in favor of unionizing. Negotiations with the City toward a first collective bargaining agreement are now in progress. The Union has been offered an opportunity to comment on the proposed legislation, and for the record, has the following observation.

In an address to the Virginia State Convention of 1829-30, Chief Justice John Marshall stated:

"The independence of all those who try causes between man and man, and between man and his government, can be maintained only by the tenure of their office. I have always thought, from my earliest youth till now that the greatest scourge an angry Heaven ever inflicted upon an ungrateful and sinning people, was an ignorant, a corrupt, or a dependent Judiciary."

We agree that impartiality and independence are the foundation of fairness to respondents, and that the quality of administrative law adjudication should be constantly improved. The display of these qualities is dependent upon the integrity and strong ethical standards of each individual judge. While the general goals of the proposed legislation are laudable, the current City Council proposal contains no structural or institutional protection for the decision-making independence of ECB’s Administrative Law Judges. Consequently, these per diem judges may be dismissed at any time and for any reason.

Prior versions of this legislation provided 4-year terms for the ALJs. Currently, OATH judges are appointed to a 5-year term. In the absence of this type of protection, much of what the City Council hopes to achieve with this proposal may not come to fruition. We strongly urge the City Council to include a provision that protects the rights of ECB’s Administrative Law Judges and safeguards against the possibility of their arbitrary dismissal.


Thank you for your consideration of this matter.


Sincerely,
Howard Schoor
Brooklyn Borough Representative