Articles

Public employee unions and sympathetic legislatures in many states have combined to perpetuate union power. One way they do this is by getting government employers – like a school district – to pay union leaders to work for the union. They negotiate a contract that gives certain teachers “release time” – basically, excusing them f ...

More than two years after oral argument, a majority of the Arizona Supreme Court today sided with Phoenix unions to require taxpayers to pay for union lobbyists ostensibly employed by the police department.  The court split 3-2 in the case, Cheatham v. DiCiccio. Justice Clint Bolick—former Goldwater Institute counsel for the plaintiffs, William ...

The City of Phoenix and the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association (PLEA), the police officers’ union, negotiated a contract whereby the city pays full salary and overtime for six full-time and 35 part-time employees who report to the union, and do the union’s work, including lobbying. This is called “release time.” The union b ...

On June 17, the Arizona Court of Appeals heard argument in Cheatham v. Diciccio to decide whether Phoenix’s contract with the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association (PLEA), whereby the city pays full salary and overtime for six full-time and 35 part-time employees who report to the union, and do the union’s work, violates the Arizona Const ...

The City of Phoenix and the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association (PLEA), the police officers’ union, negotiated a contract whereby the city pays full salary and overtime for six full-time and 35 part-time employees who report to the union, and do the union’s work.  That’s an estimated $900,000 of taxpayer money to subsidize 31,000 ...