PHOENIX (CBS5) -
The Goldwater Institute has filed another lawsuit aimed at stopping provisions of the City of Phoenix's contract with the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association.
The institute is asking a judge to grant a preliminary injunction halting the city's contract with PLEA that grants PLEA about $1 million release time dedicated to union business, which includes allowing six police officers to perform exclusively union work and collect automatic overtime.
The lawsuit comes after a new contract between the City of Phoenix and PLEA took effect July 1.
In June, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Katherine Cooper ruled in favor of the Goldwater Institute's claim that making taxpayers pay for police officers to do union work on police time was unconstitutional. That injunction expired June 30 when the city's previous contract with PLEA expired.
After the decision the Phoenix City Council declined to modify the new contract, which had essentially the same release time provisions, prompting the amended lawsuit.
In her June ruling granting the Institute's initial motion for preliminary injunction, Cooper affirmed that release time constitutes a subsidy because the contract "does not obligate PLEA to perform any specific service or give anything in return for the receipt of $1 million for release time."
Goldwater Institute Vice President of Litigation Clint Bolick said the lawsuit, "Is the next step in ridding Arizona of the awful practice of release time and returning police officers to the important jobs for which they were hired."
PLEA Board President Joe Clure said the Goldwater Institute's lawsuit has cost taxpayers a great deal of money and weakened protections for police officers.
"The Institute is attempting to build a national forum on the backs of Phoenix taxpayers," Clure said. "They pushed 58 bills from their extreme agenda this year and the Arizona Legislature wisely rejected all of them. The Institute is now seeking to achieve their goals by suing their way to victory. Be assured that this legal battle has only begun and this attack on Phoenix police officers will ultimately be decided in the higher Courts."
The Institute is representing two Phoenix taxpayers, William Cheatham and Marcus Huey, who object to the supposedly unconstitutional use of their tax money.
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