At press time, the California Supreme Court turned down the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors' appeal of a lawsuit over benefits brought by the Union of American Physicians and Dentists (UAPD) in 1999. The decision means about 800 physicians employed by Los Angeles County will be eligible for several million dollars in back pay, according to the UAPD. 

"We are very disappointed in the decision made by the California Supreme Court in the Megaflex benefit lawsuit," says John Wallace, public information officer for LA County Department of Health Services. "We are currently calculating how much money we will need to reimburse the physicians."

The Supreme Court upheld the July decision of the Court of Appeals, Second Appellate District, stating that LA County unlawfully removed the Megaflex benefits program from physicians negotiating for their first Memorandum of Understanding after having elected UAPD as their bargaining agent in May 1999.

A Los Angeles County ordinance gives its non-union professional employees 10 percent to 19 percent of pay to purchase their own health insurance and other benefits, a program called Megaflex. Because many doctors get health coverage through their spouses' health plan, they take the cash. After the physicians decided to unionize, the county withdrew Megaflex from the physicians. The courts ruled that the county's action was illegal. In making its decision, the court cited legislation the UAPD helped pass in 2002 that makes it unlawful to discriminate against employees by removing them from a health benefit plan on the basis that the employees have unionized.

"The LA County Board of Supervisors tried to punish the doctors for unionizing by taking away their benefits," says Joe Bader, regional administrator for UAPD's Southern California office and chief negotiator for the LA County physicians. "Now we are pushing to get physicians two years of benefits in back pay. We estimate the award to amount to several million dollars, which physicians won't start receiving until sometime next year."

According to UAPD, the court decision now paves the way for other currently non-represented employees, such as supervising probation officers and district attorneys, to unionize without fear that LA County will remove their benefits. The UAPD has been working closely with the Association of Deputy District Attorneys, which has been monitoring developments and is considering unionization.

"This is the final nail in the coffin for the Board of Supervisors' ill-fated attempt to punish the physicians for unionizing," Bader says. "Now the county is on the hook for making the doctors lose their benefits for an entire two-year period, and it will cost them big time."

UAPD and LA County officials will soon hold a meeting regarding calculating two years of back pay for Megaflex benefits to LA County physicians.