The Livermore Case on Retiree Health Entitlements

Livermore employee/plaintiff Joe Requa in 2011

Back in 2010 and 2011, this blog noted the case of a group of Lawrence Livermore National Lab employees who sued the Regents on the grounds that they were entitled to retiree health care even though the Lab's management had changed.* Livermore was originally managed by the Regents, but later was administered by a consortium including the Regents. The case was known as (Joe) Requa v. Regents. It is now known as Moen v. Regents.

The case raises the issue more generally of whether UC employees have a vested right to retiree health care (as they do to a pension) even though the Regents current position is that retiree health care is a nice thing they voluntarily provide but that the benefit is not an entitlement.

The wheels of justice have been grinding slowly. A ruling on December 12 says effectively that the plaintiffs should not be viewed as a single class but have to be divided because, over time, the promises made in the employee handbooks describing retiree health have become more qualified.

You can find the decision below:


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*http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2011/01/livermore-retirees-sue-university-over.html, http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2011/06/judge-dismisses-livermore-lab-retirees.html, and http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2010/10/uc-manhattan-project-legacy-potentially.html. See also http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2013/01/promises-promises-on-uc-retiree-health.html, http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2017/03/deeper-significance.html, http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2017/08/quoth-lawyers-livermore.html, and http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2017/12/promises-not-forever.html.