Penning v. Service Employees International Union, Local 1021

Background

The defendants were Service Employees International Union, Local 1021, and Service Employees International Union. The plaintiff alleged that his employer, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, withheld fair-share fees from his wages and sent them to Local 1021, the exclusive collective-bargaining representative for public employees in his unit. The fees supported Local 1021’s collective-bargaining activities.

The plaintiff sued on behalf of himself and a proposed class of people who were not union members. He asserted claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, the federal Declaratory Judgment Act, state-law conversion, and a state-law claim seeking restitution of money received. He argued that compulsory fair-share fees violated his constitutional rights under Janus v. AFSCME Council 31 and sought declarations and orders stopping future fees, as well as repayment of fees collected before Janus.

The Defendants’ Motion

The defendants moved to dismiss under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1), which permits dismissal for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. They argued that the claims for declaratory and injunctive relief were moot, that a good-faith defense barred the federal claim for retrospective monetary relief, and that the state-law claims were preempted by the Meyers-Milias-Brown Act and barred by California Government Code § 1159.

Court’s Analysis

The court held that the claims for prospective relief were moot. All fair-share-fee deductions from the plaintiff and proposed class members had stopped when the Supreme Court decided Janus, nearly one year before the complaint was filed. Because Janus had declared the deductions unconstitutional, the court found no reasonable likelihood that the deductions would recur.

The court held that the plaintiff’s § 1983 claims seeking repayment of fees collected before Janus failed as a matter of law. Applying the good-faith defense recognized by the Ninth Circuit in a similar post-Janus case, the court concluded that the union could not be held liable for fees collected when its conduct was authorized by state law and longstanding Supreme Court precedent. The union was not required to anticipate that the Supreme Court would later overturn the relevant precedent.

The court also held that the state-law claims for repayment were preempted by the Meyers-Milias-Brown Act and barred by California Government Code § 1159.

Disposition

The court granted the motion to dismiss without leave to amend because it found that all of the plaintiff’s claims had to be dismissed as a matter of law and that amendment would be futile. The action was dismissed, the Clerk was directed to close the file, and the order terminated Docket Nos. 22, 31, and 32. The order’s title also states that leave was granted to file statements of recent decision.