Du Quoin will go to arbitration over water employee termination

It's not over yet.

The City of Du Quoin has agreed to go to arbitration in the July 2013 termination of water department employee Drew Porter after Porter and Laborers Local 773 challenged what Mayor Rex Duncan calls "the process" by which the city council fired him.

The newspaper has been told that no date has been set for the arbitration hearing. In the meantime, Porter is represented by the union and the city has retained Metro East attorney Ivan Schrader to represent the city.

In early July, Porter's employment was terminated effective immediately "for cause." The termination follows an alleged drinking-related incident in the early morning hours of Tuesday, July 2 while Porter was on-call for the water department. City employees work in rotation to take after-hours calls.

Stories seem to agree that Porter had been drinking over the weekend before the Fourth of July and drove to the water department equipment building where a surveillance camera shows the trouble Porter had getting a city truck out of the building because of his condition. Duncan said he cannot confirm or deny the information because the issue is in arbitration.

Porter and the union claim there are steps to a termination according to the collective bargaining agreement which were not followed.

Porter worked within the water department where one of his primary responsibilities is reading the meters monthly across the city's large water system. He has been a city employee for more than two years.

Mayor Duncan said the position has not been filled since the Porter termination.