The National Correctional Employees Union Local No. 143, which represents Erie County correctional officers and shift supervisors, filed an unfair practice charge after the County unilaterally implemented a new prison entrance policy prohibiting employees from bringing “open containers of liquid” into the prison without written approval. Before the February 2025 policy change, bargaining-unit members regularly brought items such as coffee, soda, energy drinks, and protein shakes into the prison at the start of their shifts. Lobby officers would inspect the drinks and return them after security screening. The County changed the policy after several contraband incidents involving chewing tobacco and marijuana vape pens.
The Union alleged that the County violated Sections 1201(a)(1) and (5) of the Pennsylvania Public Employe Relations Act (PERA) by unilaterally changing a term and condition of employment without bargaining. The County argued that the policy fell within its managerial prerogatives under Section 702 of PERA because the restriction was aimed at preventing contraband from entering the prison.
The Hearing Examiner analyzed the dispute under PLRB v. State College Area School District, a Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision establishing the framework for determining whether a subject is bargainable under PERA. Under that test, the Hearing Examiner must weigh “the impact of the issue on the interest of the employe[e] in wages, hours, and terms and conditions of employment” against “its probable effect on the basic policy of the system as a whole.” If the managerial interests outweigh the employees’ interests, the subject falls within managerial prerogative under Section 702 and need not be bargained.
Applying that framework, the Hearing Examiner first concluded that the policy implicated a “condition of employment” under Section 701 of PERA. Relying on Crawford County v. PLRB, which treated workplace smoking policies as bargainable working conditions, the Hearing Examiner explained that the ability to bring coffee or other beverages into the prison at the start of a shift was “clearly relevant to [the officers’] work environment.”
The Hearing Examiner nevertheless concluded that the County’s interests predominated because the policy related directly to prison security and contraband control. Warden Michael Holman testified that he changed the policy “for the specific purpose of preventing the introduction of contraband into the prison.” Deputy Warden Gary Seymour testified that open liquid containers “cannot be completely visibly inspected” and “cannot be fully searched” because opaque liquids obscure the bottom of the container and open beverages cannot safely pass through the scanner system in the prison lobby.
The Hearing Examiner reasoned that the County’s contraband policy “goes directly to its primary mission of incarcerating prisoners and the related necessary purpose of preventing drugs and weapons from being possessed by prisoners.” The decision further concluded that the open-container restriction “strongly emanates from the prison’s core function of incarcerating prisoners and preventing drugs and weapons from being possessed by prisoners.”
Balancing the competing interests under State College, the Hearing Examiner found that the employees’ interest in bringing open beverages into work was “minimal though existent, but outweighed by the County’s significant interests in the ban.” The decision emphasized that employees could still bring sealed beverages into the prison, request exceptions from the Warden, and use an “industrial Keurig” coffee machine the County later installed. By contrast, the County demonstrated a sufficient relationship between open containers and contraband concerns, including testimony that investigators learned rumors that marijuana vape pens had previously been smuggled into the prison through an open beverage container.
The Hearing Examiner ultimately concluded that “the effect of the ban on open beverage containers on the County’s contraband policy outweighs the interest of the bargaining-unit members ability to bring an open beverage into work at the beginning of their shift.” Because the policy constituted a managerial prerogative under Section 702 of PERA, the County was not required to bargain before implementing it.
National Correctional Employees Union Local No. 143 v. Erie County, 57 PPER ¶ 61, 2026 WL 806382 (Pa. Lab. Rel. Bd. Hearing Examiner Mar. 5, 2026).