Is the Inability to Perform the Required Duties of the Job Just Cause for a Public Employee’s Discharge? It Depends. (PART I)

In November 2017, the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania issued an opinion concerning an arbitrator’s reinstatement of a state correctional officer (“CO”). The CO was responsible for monitoring inmates who worked on the prison’s loading dock. As far back as 2015, the CO’s supervisors noticed unauthorized food items in the dock area. Despite instruction to remove all unauthorized food from the dock, the CO continued to allow inmates to remove food from deliveries, and he personally took food for himself. Finding that he violated several orders, the CO was temporarily removed from his position and later reinstated. Shortly after his reinstatement, a routine search of the dock again found contraband food. This time he was discharged. The CO filed a grievance and later submitted the issue to arbitration, claiming that the Department of Corrections violated the collective bargaining agreement by discharging him without just cause. The arbitrator agreed…

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