A Fire Department dispute has reached the state Supreme Court.
Steve Loyola and Ty Medeiros, former battalion chiefs for the Hawai‘i County Fire Department, appeared before the Hawai‘i Supreme Court last week for oral arguments in a lawsuit against Hawai‘i County that stemmed from a 2014 grievance with the department.
In 2014, Loyola and Medeiros were fed up with the Hawai‘i County Fire Department. In particular, they had serious doubts about then-Fire Chief Darren Rosario’s ability to lead the department.
That year, the two battalion chiefs sent letters to Rosario, then-mayor Harry Kim, and the county Fire Commission calling for Rosario’s resignation. In his letter to Rosario, Medeiros accused the chief of “dishonesty and lack of leadership” that jeopardized HFD personnel.
In particular, Medeiros referred to a lack of communication during HFD’s response to Hurricane Iselle earlier that year, which Medeiros claimed left firefighters trapped in the field when the storm hit. He also accused Rosario of frequently asking county leadership for more money for the fire chief position while opposing pay increases for the battalion chiefs.
In November of 2014, Rosario placed Loyola and Medeiros on paid administrative leave until an investigation into “insubordinate conduct” by the two battalion chiefs was completed.
In response, just one month later, Loyola and Medeiros filed internal complaints, accusing Medeiros of unfairly retaliating against them for their letters, and intentionally humiliating them by stripping them of their badges in front of their colleagues.
Those internal complaints came to nothing; an independent review found that Rosario had acted within his authority. When the chiefs appealed the matter to the state Merit Appeals Board, it came to the same conclusion.
But Loyola and Medeiros didn’t stop. They appealed the Merit Appeals Board’s decision to the circuit court in 2016; for unclear reasons, the court took five years to come to a conclusion, but they ultimately upheld the board’s decision. The state Intermediate Court of Appeals did the same, and another appeal brought the case to the Hawai‘i Supreme Court.
The core of the chiefs’ grievances lies in the nature of how they were supposedly punished by Rosario. While the Merit Appeals Board had found that the use of paid administrative leave was proper procedure, Loyola and Rosario argued that they had been specifically left on ice for months in order to deny them overtime pay and reduce their overall retirement benefits.
“It’s hard to put an exact number on it,” Loyola told Aloha State Daily, explaining that the battalion chiefs could rely on regular overtime hours each month which they would divide between them as needed.
But, because they were on leave, Loyola and Medeiros were not able to schedule their expected overtime hours, which the two argued was an intended consequence of putting them on leave.
Loyola said he was placed on leave for seven months and was “never allowed to return to work.” He ultimately resigned in 2016 after more than 24 years with the department; Medeiros followed suit in 2017. Rosario, meanwhile, retired in 2020.
Medeiros told ASD that he was disheartened by the state of the HFD when he resigned.
“It’s the first time this has ever happened at HFD,” Medeiros said. “Before, we knew we always could go up the chain of command and talk to [the chief].”
The chiefs’ attorney, Ted Hong, said during oral arguments last week that the treatment of the chiefs constituted an “adverse action,” a term in Hawai‘i’s workplace laws referring to any imposition on an employee that is likely to dissuade that person from pursuing their rights.
Hong also suggested that the case might also touch the First Amendment right to free speech: the chiefs claimed that they were prohibited from commenting on their suspensions, even in their capacity as private citizens.
On the other hand, Mark Disher, an attorney representing Hawai‘i County, argued the chiefs had aired their grievances improperly, sending wide-ranging complaints directly up the HFD chain of command on departmental letterhead.
Disher argued that fire departments are paramilitary groups that rely on discipline to function, and that the fire chief needs to be able to trust his subordinates to follow orders.
Furthermore, Disher said Loyola and Medeiros were not deprived of overtime hours; they simply could not have those hours scheduled because they were on leave. He said a period of indefinite paid leave that concluded with no negative marks on the chiefs’ records does not constitute an adverse action, and that the Merit Appeals Board could not have awarded the chiefs “speculative amounts” of overtime pay that had never been scheduled.
While the justices of the Supreme Court questioned both attorneys last week, they did not come to any decision. The court will release an opinion on the case at an unspecified future date.
Loyola said he’s just glad the case has finally reached the Supreme Court after so many years.
Another court case on the matter, concerning whether Rosario’s actions constituted a violation of the state whistleblower protection laws, is on hold, pending the Supreme Court’s verdict.
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