Trustees of the California State University v. Public Employment Relations Board

Summary

The California Court of Appeal reviewed a Public Employment Relations Board decision concerning whether the California State University had a duty under the Higher Education Employer-Employee Relations Act to bargain over the effects of revised student vaccination requirements on faculty health and safety. The court held that substantial evidence supported an effects-bargaining duty, but found insufficient evidence that the university had implemented the policy or definitively refused to bargain when the unfair-practice charge was filed. The court set aside the finding that the university violated HEERA and remanded for effects bargaining.

Holdings

1. A nonnegotiable student vaccination-policy decision is subject to effects bargaining when it has reasonably foreseeable effects on faculty health and safety, including effects on immunocompromised faculty; ADA and FEHA accommodation procedures do not eliminate the separate right to pursue those effects through collective bargaining.
2. PERB’s finding that CSU implemented the revised policy before CFA filed its charge was not supported by substantial evidence; adoption of the policy and a stated effective date did not establish implementation absent concrete steps to carry it out.
3. An employer may satisfy its duty to seek clarification of an effects-bargaining demand through an informal exchange or meeting; formal bargaining at the bargaining table is not invariably required before the parties clarify whether a proposal concerns negotiable effects.

Questions Presented

1. Whether CSU’s revised student vaccination policy had reasonably foreseeable effects on faculty health and safety requiring effects bargaining under HEERA despite existing ADA and FEHA accommodation procedures.
2. Whether substantial evidence supported PERB’s finding that CSU had implemented the revised policy before CFA filed its unfair-practice charge.
3. Whether CSU violated its duty to bargain by offering to meet informally to clarify the policy’s bargainable effects rather than immediately engaging in formal bargaining.
4. Whether PERB’s make-whole remedy was supported after the violation finding was set aside.

Disposition

other