Brookline OK To Use Money On Alston Civil Service Appeal: Judge

BROOKLINE, MA — Town Meeting does not have authority to curb spending on the Town's appeal of a Civil Service Commission decision, a Suffolk County Supreme Judicial court ruled Wednesday.

The ruling is the latest related to the years-long case of a Brookline firefighter who Gerald Alston who brought a federal suit against the Town alleging a systemic pattern of racism and retaliation in 2015.

"The Single Justice found that Petitioner Chiuba Obele did not have standing in the matter, in part because he failed to establish that the Town's Select Board had 'a clear and unequivocal duty" to comply with the Town Meeting vote," Brookline Town Council Joslin Murphy said in a statement.

Alston's case also went before the Civil Service Commission, a government agency that regulates the employment and working conditions of municipal employees. The commission ruled in 2019 that Alston should be reinstated, with back pay. In April, a federal court ruled that there was not enough evidence to prove that the town as well as current and former Select Board members, current and former town staff and the International Association of Firefighters Local 950 had taken part in a pattern of racism and retaliation against a firefighter. Alston and his attorney are appealing that ruling. And the Town said it planned to appeal the earlier Civil Service Commission ruling.

But during discussions on the budget earlier this year at Town Meeting, the town's legislative body voted to block the funding for the appeal, many expressing a desire for the Town to admit to wrongdoing and apologize, despite winning the federal case.

Town officials said Town Meeting couldn't do that. And the justice seemed to agree, pointing out that under Brookline's bylaws, which are voted by the Town Meeting, the Select Board has authority to prosecute suits and employ counsel on the town's behalf.

"Obele's claim is that the town's legislative branch - the town meeting - by a budgetary amendment, effectively modified the town's bylaws with respect to the manner in which the board could exercise its executive discretion in the conduct of litigation," wrote Kimberly S. Budd the associate justice. "He has not, however, established that the board had a clear and unequivocal duty to comply with that amendment."

Boston resident Chiuba Obele, who has a lawsuit against the town separately for racial discrimination, filed a Petition for a Mandamus Order seeking to establish the validity the June 2020 vote by Town Meeting to curb spending on the Town's appeal of a decision of the Civil Service Commission.

Obele said he was disappointed in the ruling.

"I will be appealing and hopefully the supreme judicial court will accept that appeal and then the whole bench will think differently than that one justice," Obele said in a phone interview.

"I feel like they got me on a technicality," he said. "They focused mainly on the fact I wasn’t a resident, as opposed to the argument of whether the Select Board was right."

Obele said he puts much of his time and energy into Brookline.

"The fact that I’m not officially a resident shouldn’t have bearing," he said.

The Town's appeal of the Civil Service Commission decision is expected to be decided by the Supreme Judicial Court within the next few months.

Jenna Fisher is a news reporter for Patch. Got a tip? She can be reached at Jenna.Fisher@patch.com or by calling 617-942-0474. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram (@ReporterJenna). Have a something you'd like posted on the Patch? Here's how .