Kendrick Calfee
The Kansas City Star
(TNS)
An employment dispute between the city of Kansas City and International Association of Firefighters, Local 42, involving a firefighter sentenced in a deadly 2021 Westport crash, is outside the jurisdiction of Jackson County Circuit Court, a judge ruled this week.
The two entities will work to resolve ongoing issues with a third-party arbitrator, a process that resulted in the city filing a lawsuit against the union earlier this year. The city and union have been locked in a multiyear legal battle over whether the city can fire firefighter Dominic Biscari for causing the fatal crash while driving a Kansas City Fire Department pumper truck.
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In July, the Kansas City Star filed a motion objecting to redactions the city and union made in their respective exhibits in the suit. The exhibits, or documents presented as evidence in court to help make a case, were almost entirely redacted from public view.
A judge overruled The Star’s objections in a court order Thursday, and remanded the case back to the arbitrator to resolve the dispute.
“The judge did not explain why he is continuing to keep this information under seal,” said Bernie Rhodes, attorney for The Star.
Rhodes said the ruling is a local example of the negative effects of a new Missouri law passed in 2023, which requires the removal of personal identifiers in court documents. The statute’s broad sweeping categories of confidential information hinders public access to public information, Rhodes argues.
“If that (statute) is what the judge relied on, then it simply is further evidence of why that law needs to be changed,” Rhodes said.
Crash results in employment dispute
On Dec. 15, 2021, firefighter Dominic Biscari, 24, was behind the wheel of a Kansas City Fire Department pumper, which had activated its lights and sirens. The fire truck was speeding when it ran a red light and entered the intersection of Westport Road and Broadway Boulevard, where it struck a Honda CRV. The force of the crash propelled the vehicles northwest, causing them to hit a pedestrian before slamming into a building.
Three people died in the crash, including Jennifer San Nicolas and Michael Elwood, who were in the Honda, and Tami Knight, a pedestrian.
Biscari pleaded guilty to three counts of involuntary manslaughter and was placed on three years of probation.
Local 42 filed a grievance with the city in March 2023, claiming the city violated the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) between the city and the union when Fire Chief Ross Grundyson said the city would seek Biscari’s termination.
An arbitration process followed.
Ultimately, the arbitrator ruled Biscari should be suspended without pay for three days.
The city and fire department were directed to make Biscari whole, including back pay and all employee benefits outlined in the CBA. The city was also directed to remove any references to the incident in Biscari’s personnel file, other than a mention of the suspension and a statement that he was involved in a motor vehicle accident while on duty that due to his negligence and the negligence of others resulted in fatalities.
According to the arbitrator’s ruling, Biscari could return to work and be authorized to drive a fire truck. The city was directed to reimburse Local 42 for its costs in pursuing the employment dispute and be liable for any fees.
The city argued that the arbitrator’s finding of Biscari’s negligence, the three-day suspension, and the reimbursement for Local 42’s costs associated with pursuing the grievance went beyond its authority.
“Although the City believes the award is so intrinsically flawed that it must be vacated in its entirety, the City moves, in the alternative, to modify or correct the award,” Senior Associate City Attorney Tara Kelly wrote in the city’s motion to vacate.
‘Matters that are of the public interest’
In a court order filed Thursday, Rhodes said it appears the judge believes it is not the right time for the court to get involved in the dispute because there are unresolved issues by the arbitrator.
Arbitrations are confidential and the public will not have access to the outcome of the dispute, Rhodes said, unless, like the first time, one of the parties goes to court to challenge the outcome.
Attorneys for the city of Kansas City and Local 42 were not immediately available for comment Friday.
“There’s obviously real questions here about how (Biscari) did his job, and there’s now real questions about how the union, all of whose members get paid by the taxpayers, are reacting and causing the city to so violently disagree with the arbitration award that they went to court to stop it,” Rhodes said.
“These are, by definition, matters that are of the public interest that the public should know about,” he said.
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