CHICAGO — The latest chapter in a years long legal scuffle between the city of Chicago and two of its main police unions over COVID-19 vaccine mandates has ended with a city victory, though the fight could continue.

A three-judge appellate court panel reversed a decision by the Illinois Labor Relations Board, finding the board “abused its discretion” by siding with the union during a dispute about then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s requirement that Police Department employees either receive the COVID vaccination or pay for their own testing twice a week. Employees who didn’t do so risked being placed on no-pay status.

Attorneys for the union could not immediately be reached for comment Thursday on whether they plan to appeal.

Soon after Lightfoot announced the policy in August 2021, it became another flashpoint between the mayor and FOP Lodge 7 President John Catanzara. He urged members not to comply en masse. By December, 243 law enforcement personnel had lost pay, the Tribune reported at the time.

The city argued it had the right to unilaterally act under its current contracts with the FOP Lodge 7 and the Policemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association. The unions pushed back and said the mandate should be bargained. Both sides met for months to discuss and implement tweaks, and the city pressed ahead with the policy in October. The unions filed several grievances to the arbitrator who typically works out bargaining issues with the city.

The issue eventually made it before an administrative law judge, who largely sided with the union, concluding in part that the city should have bargained with the union on the policy’s effects and didn’t fully respond to requests for information. That included the consequences for noncompliance, implementation date, paid time off for vaccinated employees and who would bear the cost of testing.

The judge also found the city improperly changed the consequences for failing to report and got rid of the requirement that employees wear masks.

The labor relations board agreed with that administrative law judge in November 2024, ordering the city to rescind the vaccination policies and any discipline issued to employees that violated it, expunge violations from employee personnel files, reinstate anyone fired and pay back any lost wages with 7% interest. The city appealed.

Late last month, the Appellate Court of Illinois, First District, said the labor relations board should have deferred to the arbitrator, who found that existing contracts gave the city authority to implement the vaccine policy and had released guidance in the months going forward. “It was an abuse of discretion for the Board not to defer to that interpretation,” the ruling said.

The appellate court also found that the city was responsive to the union’s repeated requests for documents and information in the early days of the mandate.

“A considerable amount of information was exchanged, and as the COVID-19 crisis developed and the City responded to new situations, the Unions were clearly kept apprised,” the ruling said. “Nothing suggests that either bad faith by the City or a lack of information interfered with the Unions’ role in representing their members.”

In a social media post, the city’s law department said they’d “won a major victory.”

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