Teamsters Local Union No. 117 v. Department of Corrections

**What happened:** The Teamsters Local Union No. 117 sued the Washington Department of Corrections over unpaid wages for members of the Special Emergency Response Team (SERT). The union claimed these corrections officers should have been paid for time they spent on-call, waiting to respond to emergencies. The trial court initially dismissed the case entirely without a trial, saying the union couldn't sue on behalf of its members and that the workers weren't entitled to the wages anyway. **What the court decided:** The Washington Court of Appeals reversed this dismissal and sent the case back to the lower court. The appeals court ruled that the union does have the right to sue for its members' wages. More importantly, the court found there were genuine questions about whether the on-call time should be paid and whether minimum wage laws applied to these workers – issues that needed to be decided at trial rather than dismissed outright. **Why this matters for workers:** This ruling reinforces that unions can fight for members' wage claims in court. It also shows that courts must carefully examine on-call time situations rather than automatically assuming workers aren't owed pay. The decision gives workers hope that time spent waiting to work might be compensable, especially in emergency response roles.