By Courtney Astolfi
Advance Ohio Media
CLEVELAND — Cuyahoga County corrections officers have rejected an attempt to change union representation to the Fraternal Order of Police.
All rank-and-file county jail guards will continue to be represented by the Ohio Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, following a vote administered by the State Employee Relations Board, the OPBA announced Thursday.
The vote was conducted via secret mail ballot.
That vote was taken after some corrections officers, upset with working conditions at the county jail, sought to change representation last September to the Fraternal Order of Police.
Several guards had approached the FOP with complaints about forced overtime, unsafe working conditions, and double- and quadruple-podding -- terms used when one officer must oversee between 100 and 200 inmates at the same time. Those complaints prompted the FOP to file a petition with the state declaring that more than 30% of the guards wanted to change unions, FOP Ohio Executive Director Catherine Brockman said at the time.
The OPBA thanked corrections officers for their decision.
“We are proud to continue doing the good work of representing these members,” the OBPA said Thursday in a news release.
Now that the vote has concluded, the collective bargaining agreement negotiated by OPBA in 2019 will go into full effect, the release stated.
It includes a 23% raise for last year and 2% raises for this year and the next two years.
Prior to that, Cuyahoga County corrections officers made the second-lowest starting pay rate among Ohio’s largest 20 counties.
The higher wages in the new contract have helped the county fill open jobs, increasing staffing levels at the jail, the union said Thursday.
———
©2020 Advance Ohio Media, Cleveland