Keeping you up-to-date on our work to increase your salary, improve and protect your benefits, and aggressively represent your professional interests in every forum where they are at stake.
CASE BOARD OF DIRECTORS UPDATE
Your Life Insurance Benefit Just Increased. CASE is pleased to announce a 33% increase to your CASE-sponsored life insurance benefit. This policy that comes free with your membership is now worth $10,000. Questions about CASE life insurance or the many supplemental group rate policies available for purchase exclusively for CASE Members? Email us today.
CASE Wins Against Wasteful Outsourcing. In January 2023, CASE learned that the Department of Public Health entered into a contract with Duggan McHugh Law Corporation, an outside law firm, to perform legal work in a case that would normally be handled by civil service attorneys at the Attorney General’s Office. The sole basis for DOJ declining to represent DPH was an alleged “lack of resources,” meaning that it did not have enough attorneys, and its current legal staff was too overloaded to accept any new cases. This is a problem of the State’s own creation, of course – and one CASE works daily to address as it advocates for better wages and benefits.
CASE challenged the contract at the State Personnel Board because it is well-settled that the State cannot simply understaff civil service positions in order to justify outsourcing work that can and should be done by civil service employees. SPB quickly rejected DPH’s incredible (in the literal sense) justification that none of its 51 attorneys were competent to perform the contracted-out work and disapproved the contract. Not only does this victory save the State several hundred thousand dollars that should be paid to civil service attorneys, it also reminds all departments that they need to adequately staff their legal units. And, to do that, the State needs to pay competitive salaries and benefits that attract and retain quality lawyers.
CASE has several other challenges pending at SPB against various departments and will continue to vigorously fight against the outsourcing of CASE Members’ jobs. If you know of legal outsourcing occurring in your department, please let us know at outsidelegalcounsel@calattorneys.org.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
News of interest to Unit 2 legal professionals:
- Court reinstates suit with religious objection to California loyalty oath – San Francisco Chronicle
- Lawsuit challenges California State Park plan allowing off-road vehicles – Daily Independent
- Panel awards LA County Firefighter workers’ compensation for permanent, total disability – HRD.com
BETTER KNOW YOUR MOU
Professional Development Days. Traveling for Spring Break? Consider using your 2022-23 Professional Development Days (PDD). Unlike Vacation, Annual Leave, or PLP credits, PDDs are use-em-or-lose-em. Article 13.24 of the CASE MOU provides up to five days/40 hours of PDD each fiscal year “for activities such as, but not limited to, professional association activities, professional or personal development activities and seminars, other types of activities to enhance or promote the personal and professional growth, productivity, and goals of the employee.” In other words, PDDs are unrestricted and requested in the same manner as vacation or Annual Leave. However, unlike vacation or Annual Leave, PDDs don’t accumulate. So, when the 2023-24 fiscal year begins on July 1, any unused PDDs from the prior fiscal year vanish. Questions about PDD? Contact CASE.
REMINDERS
Become a CASE Local Representative. In addition to your all-volunteer CASE Board of Directors, CASE Members benefit from another corps of dedicated volunteers – our Local Representatives. Local Reps are the eyes and ears of CASE in the workplace and help us identify and extinguish small brush fires before they become raging infernos. Local Reps are also the first friendly face in the workplace (virtual or in-person) welcoming newly hired Attorneys, ALJs, Deputy Labor Commissioners, and Graduate Legal Assistants to state service and to CASE. Our 2023 Annual Local Rep training will be held online on Friday, April 21 from 12-3 pm. To learn more and to apply, visit the CASE website. CASE Public Service Scholars Award. With college acceptance season nearly upon us, the Board is pleased to announce the first annual CASE Public Service Scholars Award, available exclusively to CASE Members and their dependents bound for college, law school, or graduate school. Applications will be accepted from March 1 through May 1. Click here for more information and to apply.