SALEM, Ore. – Imagine your employer being able to take money from your paycheck without your permission and giving it to a third party you choose not to support solely based on the word of that third party. Now imagine having to file a lawsuit in order to get that money back and require your employer to follow the law and obtain your permission in writing to withhold money in the future.
The Freedom Foundation filed a lawsuit on Friday addressing just such a scenario.
The plaintiff, Kyle Osburn, is a Portland resident who receives compensation from Medicaid for providing home-based care for his disabled son. Starting in July, the Oregon Home Care Commission deducted money from some of Osburn’s paychecks on behalf of SEIU 503 even though he never signed a membership card or authorized the payments.
Osburn asked the union to refund the unlawfully deducted dues in October but received no response. No dues were refunded, no explanation was given and no acknowledgment of any kind was made.
The suit, filed in Marion County Circuit Court, names the state of Oregon and SEIU 503 as defendants.
Attorneys for the plaintiff seek reimbursement, with interest, of the $157 the state wrongfully confiscated from Osburn’s wages, but the case also challenges Oregon’s policy of deducting union wages without having consent in writing on file from the worker.
A ruling in Osburn’s favor would force the state to have signed permission on file before deducting dues and remitting them to the union.
“Stop and think for a minute how outrageous this situation is,” said Anne Marie Gurney, Oregon Director for the Freedom Foundation, which is representing Osburn. “In what alternate universe can a private organization simply assume an individual wants to join it and force the state to deduct dues from their paycheck without first getting their permission?”
SEIU 503 is recognized by the state as the official bargaining unit for homecare providers because it received a majority of votes in an authorization election in 1992.
Osburn, however, didn’t vote in that election and there has never been a subsequent election, meaning his wages have been garnished by a private organization he doesn’t support and never authorized based on an unconstitutional law passed when he was just a child.
Under the First Amendment, individuals have the right do determine for themselves which private organizations they consider worthwhile enough to fund with their hard-earned dollars, and that right can’t be abridged simply because a union claims that it has the right to that money.
“As is true with any other entity, the burden of proof should be on the union to prove its members truly want to be members,” Gurney said. “The state can’t simply assume they do – and take their money – until they go through some incredibly complicated and unnecessary procedure to free themselves. People should have to opt in, not out.”
It is the state’s job to protect the rights of individuals. This suit seeks to make the state verify that any money it deducts from paychecks has indeed been authorized and by so doing protects each individual’s First Amendment right of association.
