CLEVELAND, Ohio — Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb’s contract agreement with the police unions violates the consent decree aimed at reforming policing, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
The assertion that a provision in the agreement that allows for officers not to be disciplined under certain circumstances throws the issue into unknown territory.
The issue unraveled Wednesday during a hearing in federal court in Cleveland over the consent decree, the court-monitored process between the Justice Department and city to ensure constitutional policing in the city.
The city’s new contract with the police unions, struck on Oct. 13, gave major raises to officers in exchange for their agreement to work 12-hour shifts. Bibb touted the contract as “historic.” The raises came at a time when officers have fled the force for jobs with suburban departments. The department has about 400 less officers now than in 2018.
The Justice Department and consent decree monitoring team both lauded the city’s efforts at boosting pay and switching to 12-hour shifts.
The issue, however, lies with a stipulation in the new contract involving low-level violations. It says that if officers who are not the focus of a civilian’s complaint are found to commit minor infractions, they cannot be disciplined.
If a civilian-complaint investigation finds a higher-level violation, the officer can face the city’s disciplinary guidelines, previously approved by U.S. District Judge Solomon Oliver. He has overseen the reform efforts for more than eight years.
Oliver during the hearing said he plans to be “more involved” in the process, including holding more hearings and closed-door meetings between the city, Justice Department and monitoring team.
He urged the sides to meet on the discipline issue, and all involved said they would do so.
“I may have to be more directly involved in short order in this matter,” Oliver said. “If there’s something I need to do, if I need to be the determiner of fact, I can, but it won’t be today.”
Assistant U.S. Attorney Michelle Heyer said there is “serious concern” that the new collective bargaining agreement allows for some officers to “escape discipline.” She said the city is not allowed to alter key tenants of the consent decree, like fair and consistent discipline, through the collective bargaining process.
She conceded that some of the lowest-level offenses are not of serious concern, like if an officer is found using coarse language. But others are, she said, such as officers failing to show up to a mandatory court appearance, working moonlighting shifts without approval and committing minor misdemeanors.
Heyer also said that the city didn’t alert Justice Department officials or the consent-decree monitor until the deal had been worked out. Heyer said if the city had notified her, she and others would have worked with officials on a solution that didn’t violate the consent decree.
Karl Racine, the monitor who works on behalf of the judge, criticized the city for failing to reach out.
“There’s no excuse for the city not informing the monitoring team and the Justice Department,” Racine said.
He said he’s concerned that the city “chipped away at key parts of the consent decree, including accountability” through “inadvertence or worse.”
Patrick Hoban, the lead contract negotiator for the city, said no one let the Justice Department know because it was a provision added at the 11th hour of negotiations.
The collective bargaining agreement must first be approved by City Council for it to take effect.
Council President Blaine Griffin said in a phone interview that he was unaware of the issue and that council had no plans to put the agreement’s approval on Monday’s agenda.
“We’ll have to have our attorneys look at it and check all our options,” Griffin said.
City Law Director Mark Griffin said after the hearing that he’s unsure if the consent decree or the collective bargaining agreement would have to be changed. He also said he was unsure if the city would go back to the police unions to reopen negotiations, which lasted four months.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Mark Griffin said.
Jeff Follmer, the president of the Cleveland Police Patrolmen’s Association that represents rank and file officers, said as far as he’s concerned, negotiations are over and that the collective bargaining agreement stands.
He said he would refuse to reopen contract negotiations if the city asked.
“We already voted on it,” he said. “It’s done.”
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Follmer criticized the Justice Department and monitoring team, calling them “childish.” He said the provision in question only accounts for discipline of low-level offenses that don’t result in harsh punishment anyway.
“They’re nitpicking to try and justify their existence,” Follmer said.
Adam Ferrise covers federal courts at cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer. You can find his work here.
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