The Vermont Supreme Court has declined to intervene in the Scott administration’s effort to uphold its employee return-to-office policy — for now.
Last week, the Vermont Labor Relations Board ordered that the administration rescind its policy requiring employees to work at least three days per week at their worksites.
Gov. Phil Scott and top administration officials said at the time that the state would appeal the decision and request a pause on the order from both the labor board and Vermont’s high court.
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court ruled that the administration “must first seek a stay” from the labor board, denying a request to pause last week’s decision.
Steve Howard, executive director of the Vermont State Employees’ Association, called the ramifications of last week’s legal proceedings “very confusing” for state employees.
With its decision last week, the Vermont Labor Relations Board has called into question what working life could look like for the approximately 8,000 Vermont state employees.
Last summer, officials in Scott’s administration told state workers — many of whom began working from home during the Covid-19 pandemic — that beginning in December all staff had to return to their designated offices at least three days per week.
The administration’s move sparked outcry from the state employees’ union, which sought at first to have the state courts block the policy, without success.
But the labor board’s order last week has now threatened to upend the entire return-to-office policy. The order required that the state offer to rehire former employees who left their jobs as a result of the in-person work requirements. The board said Scott’s administration will also need to “make all affected employees whole” through reimbursement for “any monetary losses” caused by the return-to-office policy.
Last week, Scott called the labor board’s decision “disappointing, but not surprising,” and his office lambasted the body as “broken” following its order.
For now, life for state employees is mostly status quo. Howard said the union is telling members to follow their supervisors’ directives on where to work from.
In a Wednesday message to state employees, Administration Secretary Sarah Clark apologized for not having all the answers about how the labor board decision will impact staff.
“If the Board’s order is stayed, we will not implement it while the stay is in effect. If it is not stayed, we plan to work with the Vermont State Employees’ Association to act on the Board’s order,” she wrote. “We understand the uncertainty is not ideal, and it is not how we prefer to approach this situation.”
The state filed a request for a stay with the labor board April 2, according to Lauren Jandl, chief of staff in the Vermont Attorney General’s Office.
In an email, Jandl said the next legal step is for the state employees’ union to respond to the administration’s filing with the labor board. The state then has another opportunity to reply, Jandl said, and the labor board can make a ruling on the request for a stay after that.
