## Facts

- A county and a prison-guards union were parties to a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) containing a broad grievance-arbitration clause and an integration clause, but no past-practice clause.
- The union filed a grievance seeking (1) guard supervision of the officers’ lounge during mealtimes and (2) permission for guards to choose any food available from the jail kitchen rather than prisoner-menu options.
- The CBA did not expressly address either mealtime condition.
- The dispute proceeded to arbitration; the county appeared specially.
- The arbitrator found the grievance arbitrable and sustained it, ordering the county to provide lounge supervision at mealtimes and expanded meal-choice rights, relying substantially on alleged pre-agreement past practices.
- The Commonwealth Court set aside the award as nonarbitrable.
- The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania reviewed both arbitrability and whether the award could be sustained under the CBA.

## Issues

1. Whether the mealtime-conditions grievance was arbitrable as a dispute “arising out of the interpretation or application” of the CBA.
2. Whether an arbitrator may base a remedial award on pre-agreement past practice when the CBA is integrated, contains no relevant substantive term, and lacks any past-practice clause.
3. Whether the award could “in any rational way be derived from the agreement,” as required for judicial confirmation of a labor arbitration award.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court held the grievance was arbitrable under the CBA’s broad arbitration clause and the strong presumption favoring arbitration absent clear exclusion.
- The Court nonetheless affirmed the order setting aside (vacating) the arbitrator’s award.
- The Court concluded the award lacked a rational contractual basis because the CBA contained no language supporting the ordered mealtime conditions and the integration clause foreclosed importing pre-agreement practices as binding terms.

## Legal Principles

- Public-employee grievances arising out of interpretation or application of a CBA are presumptively subject to arbitration; only forceful evidence of an intent to exclude a claim overcomes that presumption where the arbitration clause is broad.
- Judicial review of a labor arbitration award is limited to whether the award can, in any rational way, be derived from the CBA’s language, context, and other indicia of the parties’ intent.
- An arbitrator may not impose obligations grounded solely in pre-agreement past practice when the CBA is integrated, omits the disputed subject matter, and contains no clause incorporating past practice as a contractual term.

## Conclusion

The grievance over prison-guard mealtime conditions was properly arbitrable, but the award was vacated because it was not rationally derived from the integrated CBA and improperly treated pre-agreement past practices as enforceable contract terms.


County of Allegheny v. Allegheny Cnty. Prison Emps. Indep. Union, 381 A.2d 849 (Pa. 1977)