In 2023, the City of Englewood Police Department in New Jersey changed schedules, increasing shift hours from 8.25 to 11 hours per day. This change impacted supervisors’ ability to take vacation under the established past practice, which allowed supervisors to take vacation as long as at least one supervisor remained on a given shift. The Englewood Police Department Supervisory Officers Association filed a grievance.
On June 6, 2024, an arbitrator sustained the grievance. The award stated: “The City shall cease and desist from imposing the new vacation leave policy and restore vacation leave eligibility to SOA members on a given shift as long as there is at least one SOA member remaining on the shift.” The arbitrator rejected the City’s argument that granting such vacation requests would create unacceptable overtime costs.
On the same day that the award was issued, the Department issued a revised general order increasing the minimum required supervisor staffing on most shifts from one to two. The Union filed an unfair practice charge with PERC, seeking interim relief. On July 31, 2024, the New Jersey PERC Designee granted interim relief in I.R. No. 2025-2, ordering the City to comply with the arbitrator’s award.
The City responded on August 8, 2024, with Special Order 2024-02. It stated supervisors would “generally” be granted a full vacation day if it did not drop supervisor manning below one for any part of the shift. It created a complex system for a second supervisor’s request, granting it “with stipulation” but allowing it to be rescinded and denied within 24 hours of the shift if manning dropped below one for any reason, including sick leave, injury, or training. The order warned that any supervisor who took sick leave in such a situation would be subject to an internal affairs investigation.
After the Union sought enforcement in Superior Court, a judge ordered the City on February 3, 2025, to comply with PERC’s interim relief order. Three days later, on February 6, Police Chief Thomas Greeley issued an email stating the City would “continue to grant supervisor time off in the same manner it did before February 3, 2025.” The email added: “Supervisors will be granted vacation time as long as one supervisor remains, and no overtime is created. You are welcome to put in for those days, but they will not be approved unless they fall within those parameters.”
The Union moved for contempt. The Superior Court judge deferred jurisdiction to PERC to determine whether the August 8 special order and the February 6 email were consistent with the arbitration award and the PERC interim relief order.
The Hearing Examiner found both documents violated the prior rulings. The special order’s “with stipulation” approval and threat of investigation for calling out sick imposed new, restrictive conditions that did not exist under the past practice upheld by the arbitrator. Greeley’s email impermissibly added an “overtime” condition to approval, which the arbitrator had explicitly rejected as a justification for denying vacation.
The Hearing Examiner noted that the City never sought to clarify, modify, or vacate the arbitration award through proper legal channels. The Hearing Examiner concluded that the City’s actions repudiated the collective bargaining agreement between the Union and the City’s past practice clause, violated the arbitration award, and interfered with employee rights.
The Hearing Examiner recommended that the Superior Court order the City to cease and desist from these practices, rescind the special order and Greeley’s email directive, and approve supervisor vacation requests on any of the six distinct reporting shifts so long as one supervisor remains on that specific shift at the time of the request, even if granting the request ultimately requires overtime.
City of Englewood, 52 NJPER ¶ 31 (PERC Hearing Examiner Oct. 7, 2025).