Labor Law: Teacher Disputes

The vast majority of labor law issues presented to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court during the previous seven years were rooted in the confusion surrounding the role of collective bargaining in public school teacher disputes. Indicative of the unsettled nature of this area is the tension between the teacher termination statutes and the Municipal Public Employee Labor Relations Law (hereinafter referred to as MPELRL). Despite the later enactment of MPELRL and its more specific provisions, the court has consistently refused to give it wide application in teacher disputes, choosing instead to rely on the more amorphous statutory provisions defining the duties and powers of local school districts. Its unwillingness to subject teacher termination to the arbitration provisions of MPELRL evidences the court's decision to distinguish teachers from other groups of municipal employees, at least for purposes of collective bargaining. Although public policy arguably provides a basis for the court's decision, the broad statutory language of MPELRL does not appear to support such a construction.