Discord with police union

A former Hawthorn Woods police officer who says he was fired for backing a new union has filed suit against the village police chief and police commissioners, requesting legal fees and to be restored to his position.

The village now faces that lawsuit, two Illinois Labor Relations Board complaints and a union contract negotiation as part of its conflicts with the police squad following the November 2006 unionization.

The lawsuit, an administrative law complaint filed Aug. 14 in Lake County court, concerns whether Hawthorn Woods fired former Police Sgt. Michael Viramontes.

Ronald Cicinelli, attorney for Viramontes and the patrol officers in the ILRB complaints, said Viramontes asked in July to be demoted so he could be represented by the patrol officers union. The village maintains Viramontes quit.

"I have a paper from (Viramontes) that said he resigned," Mayor Keith Hunt said, adding he would not discuss individual personnel matters. Police Chief Jennifer Paulus deferred comment on the complaint to Hunt.

Cicinelli, who filed another complaint before the ILRB on Viramontes' behalf, said it's obvious why the village didn't let his client become a patrol officer.

"Mr. Viramontes was supporting the unionization of the police officers. This upset the village, in particular, Mayor Hunt immensely," Cicinelli said. "(The firing) was more or less retaliatory."

He said Viramontes only wants to return to the police department with back pay and benefits.

"Mike is willing to go back to work," Cicinelli said, adding legal action was a last course. "If we can reach an agreement and avoid litigation, that's where we want to go."

But the administrative law complaint isn't the only legal trouble stemming from the patrol officers' unionization.

The new union, the Metropolitan Alliance of Police, Hawthorn Woods Chapter #483, also filed a complaint before the Illinois Labor Relations Board on behalf of the 11-member squad.

In the ILRB complaint, patrol officers say their pay was frozen, time off was limited and overtime compensation was removed after they decided to form a union.

"I think they felt a sense of disloyalty and almost a sense of betrayal," Cicinelli said. "They were given these benefits and then the village took them away."

Village officials deny all charges in the filing.

"I would say that we did not do anything unfair nor would we," Hunt said. "It's nothing more than posturing by the union to gain some advantage. … There has been no retaliation of any kind taken to any officer."

The police officers also say Hunt held individual meetings in October and November 2006 in which he told the employees that negotiating a collective bargaining agreement would "cost the village $50,000, just in legal fees, with those costs coming out of the police department's budget," according to the ILRB filing.

Hunt said he did speak with officers and told them only that in an expensive negotiation, the money would have to come from somewhere.

"Lawyers cost money. Employees want raises, they want benefits," he said. "If you're dealing with a limited budget, you can either pay lawyers or pay employees, but it's difficult to pay both."

Neither the ILRB complaints, the administrative law complaint nor the police union's first-ever contract have been settled. The next meeting on contract talks is set for October, Hunt said.

A tentative date for a hearing on the ILRB complaint is Feb. 13 and 14, but Cicinelli said he hopes it doesn't have to go that far.

"The union is always willing to reach an amicable agreement," he said. "That's always been our position."