Facts

The California Public Employment Relations Board requested a court order blocking essential employees from striking in a dispute over the University's pension overhaul. The employees are members of American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, Local 3299 (AFSCME) and University Professional & Technical Employees–Communications Workers of America Local 9119 (UPTE), which represents thousands of University of California medical center workers.

The Board's request was made after the UC system filed unfair practice charges with the Board to enjoin the strikes entirely. The Board granted UC's request in part, and applied for a temporary restraining order.

PLAINTIFF'S CONTENTIONS:
The Board argued that there was reasonable cause to believe a strike by certain respiratory therapists, perfusionists, pharmacists, imaging technicians, and cardiovascular technicians, would create a "substantial and imminent threat to the health or safety of the public," and would be unlawful under County Sanitation Dist. No. 2 v. Los Angeles County Employees Ass'n (1985) 38 Cal.3d 564.

DEFENDANT'S CONTENTIONS:
Defendants contend that AFSCME gave ten days advance notice of a two-day strike, and UPTE gave notice that its members would honor the picket lines in a one-day sympathy strike after bargaining for more than seven months, and exhausting mandatory mediation and factfinding procedures.

The unions disputed that the noticed strikes would threaten public health or safety because employees at comparable private sector hospitals, which provide many of the same health care services as the UC medical centers, are permitted to strike under the National Labor Relations Act. The unions argued that the UC medical centers, like private sector hospitals, can adequately safeguard their patients by using supervisors, nurses, doctors, and temporary replacement workers to perform the duties of striking workers. Nevertheless, the unions agreed that employees in certain classifications--including clinical laboratory scientists, respiratory therapists, and hospital radiation physicists--would not strike in order to maintain weekend staffing levels.

Result

The court granted the temporary restraining order as to the classifications agreed to by the unions, as well as pharmacists, and denied the TRO as all other classifications.