Green Tree School v. UCBR - Cmwlth. Court - October 19, 2009 (2-1)
http://origin-www.courts.state.pa.us/OpPosting/Cwealth/out/7CD09_10-19-09.pdf
Majority
The court reversed the UCBR and held that Claimant’s stated safety concerns and Employer’s refusal to allow her to participate in a staffing decision gave her necessitous and compelling reasons to resign. Concluding that they did not, we reverse the Board.
Employer is a private school for children with autism and emotional disturbances, where Claimant worked for seven years as the Director of Education. She quit her job when another job position, behavior health coordinator -- which was occupied by her life partner -- was eliminated, without any consultation with the claimant.
Claimant submitted a resignation letter to the school’s board of directors that its “decision to cut the position of Behavior Coordinator for the coming year … has resulted in my resignation.” The board accepted the resignation.
The court agreed with the Employer contention that claimant’s concerns regarding the “physical and emotional safety” of the persons at the school was speculative and that claimant did not take reasonable steps to preserve her employment.
The court rejected claimant's argument that the elimination of the position made the school unsafe for the children, citing only cases about a claimant's own personal safety. "There is simply a disconnect between the harm posited by claimant and her personal safety....The test is not whether a claimant’s belief is a genuine one. Rather, the test is whether the claimant has demonstrated that the workplace environment has placed “real,” i.e., actual and extreme, pressure on the claimant....Claimant’s self-serving testimony did not demonstrate that she was unsafe or that the workplace was unsafe with the kind of objective evidence presented" in other cases.
The exclusion of the claimant from the staffing decision did not give her good cause to quit either. "Employees do not enjoy a general right to participate in management decisions, such as how many staff are needed in another department. In addition, [the school director] explained that claimant should not have been involved in this particular personnel decision precisely because of her relationship with" the employee whose position was eliminated -- her life partner.
Claimant also "failed in her duty to preserve employment." It was "not her prerogative" to make a demand to be involved in the staffing position. She quit before waiting to seehow the staffing change would affect her or the school before announcing her resignation. "Claimant simply issued an ultimatum to Employer that it yield to her views, but the ultimatum did not satisfy her duty to preserve employment."
Dissent
Without addressing the issue head-on, the dissent said that danger to the children, and just claimant, would constitute good cause, and that the claimant had established such a danger. The dissent felt that claimant notified the employer of the problem in advance of quitting and left the job only when the employer did not address the problem.
