Electrician Victimized
FDNY Scolded For Anti-Union Actions

By RICHARD STEIER

A Fire Department Electrician who charged that he was the victim of retaliation - including his firing - for filing grievances against his supervisors has won a favorable ruling from the city Board of Collective Bargaining.

BRIAN COLELLA: Victimized for standing up.

The BCB's finding that the Fire Department committed an improper labor practice was the second time in three months that the agency was found to have punished Brian Colella out of vindictiveness. In March, an arbitrator had ordered that he be reinstated and receive all back pay, seniority and other benefits to which he was entitled for the roughly four years that he had been banished from the FDNY payroll.

City Reps Concurred

The BCB considered virtually the same set of facts in reaching its decision, and the unambiguous way that the FDNY violated the New York City Collective Bargaining Law was underscored by the fact that the two city-appointed members of the panel joined in making it a unanimous ruling.

Particularly damning for the Fire Department was the fact that when two of the supervisors accused of being ringleaders in the alleged retaliation testified, "they did not deny making the specific comments attributed to them" threatening Mr. Colella for filing grievances, the decision stated.

Mr. Colella, who began working for the Fire Department in 1989, filed his first grievance four years later. He testified that the then-Supervisor of Electricians, Anthony Bianchino, told him that his complaint would merely anger "a lot of people," and "we're going to take away your Department vehicle, make you report to the shop."

Not a Man of Letters

Five years later, after Mr. Colella filed another grievance, he said a different supervisor told him he hated "f------ letter-writers" and that his days working in that shop near his Staten Island home were "finished."

In the arbitration case, the hearing officer, Mattye M. Gandel, found that the current FDNY Assistant Commissioner for Facilities, Joseph Mastropietro, in some cases placed disciplinary charges in Mr. Colella's file without notifying him, which she noted made it easier to build a case for firing him four years ago because he had no opportunity to correct the behavior at issue.

In the BCB case, while city officials claimed there were legitimate reasons for all the charges filed against Mr. Colella, the panel cited three different instances in which Mr. Mastropietro initiated proceedings against him within three days of Mr. Colella's filing a grievance.

Timing Spelled Revenge

"Taken as a whole," the BCB decision stated, "such evidence provides support that Mastropietro's actions were in retaliation for Colella filing grievances."

The arbitrator had found the testimony given against Mr. Colella by Mr. Mastropietro and another supervisor, Dominick Moretti, "unconvincing, contradictory and evasive."

The BCB was not as harsh in its assessment but stated that "we do not find credible Moretti and Mastropietro's testimony that they were not motivated by anti-union animus" in trumping up cases against Mr. Colella after he exercised his right to file grievances. It also noted that they had not disputed Mr. Colella's version of the conversations in which he alleged that they had threatened to retaliate against him.

Besides citing the city for an improper labor practice, the BCB ordered the Fire Department to cease denying overtime to Mr. Colella because of his exercise of his rights, and cease referring allegations of improper conduct on his part to its Bureau of Investigations and Trials.