A union representing employees who work in Montgomery County parks has filed a grievance and unfair labor practice charge against the park commission, alleging unsafe conditions for employees during the coronavirus pandemic.
The Municipal and County Government Employees Organization, or MCGEO, filed the grievance on Monday and filed the charge on Wednesday against the Maryland-National Park and Planning Commission, which operates and maintains parks in Montgomery County.
According to the grievance, the commission has not provided emergency pay during the public health emergency, as required in provisions in the union’s collective bargaining agreement.
The commission has also refused to provide adequate personal protective equipment and institute social distancing among employees, which creates a risk of “serious bodily harm,” the union wrote in the grievance.
In the April 8 charge, the union said Casey Anderson, vice chair of the commission, “admonished” employees at an April 2 meeting for complaining about safety concerns regarding the coronavirus.
“Mr. Anderson instructed employees to keep quiet because they were ‘lucky to still have jobs,’” the union wrote in the filing. “Mr. Anderson told the Union members that the Commission would not comply with any ‘social distancing’ measures and that their working conditions would be ‘business as usual.’”
Anderson told Bethesda Beat on Monday that the commission thought the complaint was “baseless.”
“We think it is without merit. But we’re going to work through the collective bargaining process and the system that is set up to resolve these kinds of disputes,” he said. “I’m not in a position to air it out and litigate it in the press. … I would say that there are many mischaracterizations and inaccuracies in what they’ve laid out in the complaint.”
Anderson said that the situation would likely be handled with a hearing in front of a labor administrator within two weeks.
All employees were offered 40 hours of social distancing leave about three weeks ago, he said. Anderson said the social distancing leave was time off in addition to employees’ regular vacation and sick time.
In the grievance, the union requested that the commission retroactively pay, to March 20, 2020, “all employees required to report to work at the worksites at the double-time and a half rate as outlined in the collective bargaining agreement.” It also requested that the commission restore all personal leave used and any lost wages by employees required to report to the worksite starting March 20.
Anderson said there have been ongoing conversations between the union and commission about hazard pay.
A representative for MCGEO could not be immediately reached for comment on Monday.
In the filed charge, the union stated that Anderson said that if the union successfully bargained for hazard pay, the result would be park closures, layoffs and furloughs.
In its complaints, the union also said not all employees who can telework are being allowed to and that four or five workers sometimes use the same park vehicle at one time.
But Anderson said any employee who can telework already is.
“In general, our approach was to try to use telework as much as possible to thin out the workforce and limit the exposure to each other in the workplace,” he said. “I would just say that we feel very comfortable that we have acted in the best interest of both the public and our employees … and also have been attentive to the safety of our employees and have acted appropriately to try to protect them, as well as members of the public.”
Asked to comment on the additional claims in the union’s filed charge, Anderson said he couldn’t provide specific answers.
“There are quite a lot of inaccurate statements and characterizations in that complaint,” he said.
According to MCGEO, about 600 employees work in the parks and are represented by the union.
Anderson said about two-thirds of the parks employees are in the union.
The union requested the commission to respond to the grievance within five days and said it would “proceed to immediate arbitration” if there were no resolution.
Briana Adhikusuma can be reached at briana.adhikusuma@moco360.media.