By J.D. Davidson
The Center Square
Three county employees in Northwest Ohio will get back money taken from their paychecks for union dues after setting a lawsuit with American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union.
The settlement comes a little more than four months after the three filed the federal civil rights lawsuit saying the union violated their First Amendment rights by collecting the dues after they resigned from the union.
AFSCME Council 8 agreed to return the money taken from Penny Wilson, Theresa Fannin and Kozait Elkhatib, three Lucas County Job and Family Services employees, according to a news release from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.
Wilson will receive $582, while Fannan will get $622, and Elkhatib will get $591. The three were represented by the foundation, along with The Buckeye Institute, without charge.
“Once again Foundation-backed Ohio public employees have successfully defended their Janus rights against the schemes of AFSCME union officials, who were more concerned with accumulating dues money than respecting the First Amendment,” National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix said. “America’s public workers should not have to file federal lawsuits to defend their Janus rights. Instead, before taking dues, union officials should inform workers about their Janus rights and honor those rights.”
The lawsuit said the union enforced a policy that allowed taking union dues directly from paychecks. The policy gave those who resigned from the union a few days to stop the deductions. Union officials, according to the lawsuit, never informed the three their union dues deduction would continue because they missed the “escape” period.
“It’s heartening that the union has agreed to resolve this dispute by honoring their former members’ wishes; it’s disappointing that a lawsuit was required to reach that common-sense result,” said Jay R. Carson, senior litigator at The Buckeye Institute.
As previously reported by the Center Square, 10 other public employees from Boardman, Toledo, Akron, Maumee, Galloway, Upper Sandusky, Columbus and Bowling Green also filed a similar suit in late December. That lawsuit is currently working its way through Franklin County Common Pleas Court in Columbus.
