The Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission (WERC) balloting period for school districts’ annual recertification elections opens at 12:00 PM CST on November 7, 2024, and closes at 12:00 PM CST on November 27, 2024.
The annual recertification election requirements arose out of Act 10. Prior to Act 10, a representative for purposes of collective bargaining remained in place unless thirty percent (30%) of the collective bargaining unit’s members sought a certification election and a majority of the unit’s members voting in the election voted to decertify the representative. Since Act 10, however, collective bargaining representatives remain in place only if they receive at least fifty-one percent (51%) of the votes of all members in the bargaining unit (i.e., regardless of whether those members voted or not). See Wis. Stat. § 111.70(4)(d)3.b. and Wis. Admin. Code § ERC 70.01.
In order to continue serving as the exclusive representative of the bargaining unit, a labor organization currently representing a bargaining unit of school district employees must have filed a petition for an annual election with the WERC on or before September 15, 2024, on a form provided by the WERC. The labor organization must also have submitted the appropriate fee to the WERC (based upon the size of the bargaining unit) and served a copy of the petition electronically on the school district.
If a labor organization did not submit a timely petition with the WERC, the labor organization’s representation of the bargaining unit would have ceased on September 15, 2024, or upon the expiration of the current bargaining agreement. In such cases, employees from those bargaining units would be prohibited from participating in a substantially similar collective bargaining agreement for a minimum of one (1) year.
If a school district received such a petition, however, the school district must have acted on the petition within ten (10) days by providing the WERC with a proposed voter eligibility list (i.e., an electronically sortable alphabetical list of employee names employed in the bargaining unit, along with the last four (4) digits of those employees’ social security numbers).
At the same time, the school district must have provided the petitioning labor organization with the proposed voter eligibility list. The petitioning labor organization then had ten (10) days in which to respond by providing the WERC and the school district with an alphabetical list of employee names that should have been added or deleted from the school district’s proposed voter eligibility list.
Assuming the aforementioned occurred, the recertification election will open on November 7, 2024, and eligible voters will be able to vote by telephone or online. If voting by telephone, employees will be asked for information confirming they are indeed eligible voters. After providing that information, eligible voters will be asked if they want to continue to be represented by their current labor organization for the purpose of collective bargaining. Eligible voters must follow the instructions to cast a “yes” or “no” response and must confirm their responses before their votes are officially cast. If voting online, employees will be asked to follow similar on-screen instructions to cast their votes.
If a collective bargaining representative does not receive at least fifty-one percent (51%) of the votes cast between November 7 and 27, 2024, the WERC must decertify the representative at the expiration of the current collective bargaining agreement, and the employees may not be represented in a substantially similar collective bargaining unit for twelve (12) months from the date of decertification.
If school districts have questions about the annual recertification process, they are encouraged to consult with legal counsel.
