Sunline Transit Agency v. AMALGAMATED TRANSIT UNION, LOCAL 1277

Plaintiff SunLine Transit Agency (SunLine) appeals from a judgment entered after the trial court denied SunLine’s petition to vacate a contractual arbitration award, and granted a petition to confirm the award, brought by SunLine’s employee, Rafael Navarette (Navarette), and Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 1277 (the Union), referred to collectively as respondents. In the award, the arbitrator found that SunLine terminated Navarette without good cause in violation of the collective bargaining agreement, also known as a memorandum of understanding (the MOU). SunLine was thus ordered to reinstate Navarette as a motor coach operator (bus driver), with backpay, less interim earnings and vocational rehabilitation compensation.

SunLine contends the arbitration award should be vacated on the grounds the award contravenes public policy under the Workers’ Compensation Act (WCA) (Lab. Code, § 3600 et seq.) and the arbitrator exceeded his powers under the MOU (Code Civ. Proc., § 1286.2, subd. (a)(4)). SunLine also argues that respondents were estopped from using arbitration as a competing forum to contest workers’ compensation findings and remedies.

We conclude the trial court…