Milwaukee City Wire

Milwaukee Public School District employees are being paid to perform work solely related to teachers’ union business.

The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty (WILL), a Milwaukee-based conservative think tank, has filed a lawsuit contesting that policy, claiming it violates the requirement that public money must only be spent on public work, and that school district employees' salary and benefits are being paid for work for the union and its members, not the public.

WILL deputy counsel, Lucas Vebber, told Milwaukee City Wire that employees are given time away from their regular jobs to perform union duties, yet are still being paid by the district. Union members are given a maximum 10 days annually to take paid leave for this purpose, unless an exception is made.

The MPS union leave policy states, “Each designated collective bargaining unit may request that its representatives be released with pay to engage in union-related activities for a maximum of 10 days per fiscal year. Any union may request additional leave for its representatives, including full release up to one school year.”

“The policy we are challenging allows release with pay to engage in ‘union-related activities' but that term is undefined by the policy,” Vebber said. “Under the language of the policy there is no oversight or requirement to show how specifically that time was used.”

In a Jan. 28 notice of claim sent to Superintendent Keith Posley, WILL said the union policy violates the state Constitution.

“MPS’s union leave policy amounts to unconstitutional compelled speech,” the letter states. “When an MPS employee uses taxpayer-funded union leave, that employee is working for the union, providing support to the union, and expressing support for and directly conducting the unions’ political and ideological activities.”

The Milwaukee Public Schools is the largest school district in the state, with approximately 77,746 students as of 2018, according to the district website.

It has approximately 10,000 employees, with an annual budget of $1.2 billion for the 2020-21 school year.

Vebber said it’s unclear how much has been paid to district employees to perform union duties but he said it is surely a rather high figure.

“I do not have an estimate for the past 10 years,” he said. “There are a number of labor unions who represent various MPS employees, and we believe the district has spent thousands of dollars paying employees for hundreds of hours engaged in these union-related activities under the policy.”

Vebber said his WILL, a Milwaukee-based conservative think tank, said the issue is not union activity.

He told Urban Milwaukee that it does object “to the union being able to speak or advocate on behalf of its members at all, the objection here is to who pays for it. Our goal would be for all this time to be reimbursed."

He said public agencies need to be good stewards of our tax dollars.

Vebber also made the distinction that the issue is public dollars, not unions in general.

“This suit involves a public employer using public resources to allow public employees to engage in ‘union-related activities,'” which can include political activism, “so this is unique from other union reps who may represent a private employer,” he told The Center Square.

The United States Supreme Court recently decided in Janus v. AFSCME that “[c]ompelling a person to subsidize the speech of other private speakers raises similar First Amendment concerns.” The Wisconsin Constitution recognizes that the freedom of speech “includes both the right to speak freely and the right to refrain from speaking at all.” 

WILL alleges that the MPS union leave policy amounts to taxpayers subsidizing the speech and activities of labor unions – a form of unconstitutional compelled speech.

Vebber noted another issue: under part of MPS policy, they will bill the labor union for employee leave time in excess of 10 days.

“We are not challenging that part of the policy,” he said.

The think tank is open about its goals, as is stated on its website:

“WILL was launched to litigate: we take the fight for freedom to the courts, and to retake ground that had long been ceded to activists who used the courts to erode the freedom and prosperity of all Americans. We defend small business owners, teachers, parents, and others from a wide variety of backgrounds against the government and well-financed interests from Washington, D.C., and Madison. The success we have gained in this arena comes from putting together a remarkably talented team. Our record in litigation is among the best nationwide for public interest law firms because we’ve invested in bringing in the finest attorneys in the freedom movement — think the legal version of the Navy Seal Team Six.”

Vebber previously served as the executive director of the WMC Litigation Center.