A state district court dismissed the International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) Local 1197 lawsuit against Edison Township.
The IAFF, led by President Robert Yackel and firefighters Anthony Pepe and James Walsh, in January 2012 filed a complaint against Mayor Antonia Ricigliano, Township Management Specialist William Stephens, former Business Administrator Dennis Gonzalez and former Public Safety Director Richard Laird.
The complaint alleged that township officials retaliated against the union, because it had publicly criticized their management of the fire department and campaigned against Stephens when he ran for mayor in 2005.
The alleged retaliation included reduction of staffing; the deduction of 1.5 percent of the firefighters’ base salary as an employee contribution toward health insurance; the replacement of union firefighters with civilian “fire prevention specialists”; and an executive order pursuant to the Faulkner Act, barring all township employees from discussing municipal business directly with members of the Township Council.
The other alleged retaliation points included the hiring of fulltime, non-union emergency medical technicians to perform rescue services that had previously been performed by firefighters, which reduced pay for 36 firefighters; disciplinary discrepancy when a firefighter hit a parked car while operating a township vehicle and received a verbal reprimand; and the township’s higher rate of compensation for off-duty police officers than for the offduty firefighters working during the Barclays PGA Tour golf tournament in 2011.
“The facts alleged in this complaint have been the subject of 13 different proceedings in five different forums,” the decision stated. “The legal issues raised in this complaint have been litigated ad nauseum.”
In May 2011, the plaintiffs filed a complaint in the same court containing allegations nearly identical to the allegations in this complaint; however, before any motions were filed, the plaintiffs voluntarily dismissed the 2011 complaint.
The court said because the plaintiffs have already had innumerable opportunities to litigate the issues presented, the court found that the complaint should be dismissed.
The defendants argued that the plaintiffs are barred from res judicata, or re-litigation, and the court agreed.