UNFAIR PRACTICE ISSUES; PROTECTED ACTIVITIES – Speech

Single Topic for Decision 2605E

View all topics for Decision 2605E

Full Decision Text (click on the link to view): Full Text

Because “not every impropriety committed during [otherwise protected] activity places [an] employee beyond the protective shield of the [A]ct” (City of Oakland (2014) PERB Decision No. 2387-M, pp. 23-24), employee speech that is related to employer-employee relations will generally not lose its statutory protection unless it is so “opprobrious, flagrant, insulting, defamatory, insubordinate, or fraught with malice as to cause substantial disruption of or material interference” with the employer’s operations. (Chula Vista Elementary School District (2018) PERB Decision No. 2586, p. 16 (internal quotation marks omitted); City of Oakland, supra, PERB Decision No. 2387-M, p. 24; Rancho Santiago Community College District (1986) PERB Decision No. 602, p. 13; Pomona Unified School District (2000) PERB Decision No. 1345, p. 16 (Pomona).) (p. 10.)