¹ STATE LAW CLAIMS (COUNTS 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 8) To determine whether Section 301 preempts Plaintiffs’ state law claims, the Court must determine whether the claims raise “purely factual questions” that do not require the Court to interpret any CBA term or provision.2, Haw. Airlines, Ine. v.

² FEDERAL LAW CLAIMS (Counts 4, 5, 9) The FLSA grants individual employees broad access to the courts. Section 16(b) of the Act, 29 U.S.C. § 216(b), which contains the principal enforcement provisions, permits an aggrieved employee to bring his statutory wage and hour claims ‘in any Federal or State court of competent jurisdiction.’ No exhaustion requirement or other procedural barriers are set up, and no other forum for enforcement of statutory rights is referred to or created by the statute. Barrentine v. Arkansas-Best Freight Sys., Inc., 450 U.S. 728, 740 (1981). “FLSA rights cannot be abridged by contract or otherwise waived because this would ‘nullify the purposes’ of the statute and thwart the legislative policies it was designed to effectuate.” Jd. Emphasizing the importance of these rights, the United States Supreme Court has “held that congressionally granted FLSA rights take precedence over conflicting provisions in a collectively bargained compensation arrangement.” Jd. at 740-41; OBrien v. Town of Agawam, 350 F.3d 279, 285 (1st Cir. 2008) (quoting Alexander v. Gardner-Denver Co., 415 U.S. 36, 50 (1974)) (“The distinctly separate nature of these contractual and statutory rights is not vitiated merely because both were violated as a result of the same factual occurrence.”); Urbani v. Wellesley Coll. Civil Action No. 13-cv-11768-ADB, 2016 WL 6571247, at *7 (D. Mass. Jan. 12, 2016) (“It is well- established that an employee’s federal statutory rights under the FLSA exist separately and independently from any rights arising out of a collective bargaining agreement....” ); Manning v. Bos. Med. Ctr. Corp., 725 F.3d 34, 51-53 (1st Cir. 2013) (CBAs do not foreclose claims under the FLSA). “Moreover, the collective-bargaining process encouraged by the LMRA may, in some cases, erode individual rights protected by the FLSA.” Urbani, 2016 WL 6571247, at *7. Defendants move to dismiss Plaintiffs’ FLSA claims that are also based on allegations of failure to properly account for overtime and bridge pay and for retaliation. They acknowledge that Section 301 does not preempt federal claims such as those filed under the FLSA and the law is clear that FLSA claims, even if the allegations overlap with contractual or state law claims, are not required to be grieved or arbitrated. Barrentine, 450 U.S. at 740-41; Manning, 725 F.3d at 51-53. Defendants try to parse this principle, however, by arguing that they are not asking that Plaintiffs grieve and arbitrate the FLSA claims themselves, but that they should grieve and arbitrate the meaning of certain terms in the CBA before litigating their federal claims in court. To state a claim for nonpayment of wages and overtime under the FLSA, Plaintiffs need only plausibly plead that they are covered employees under the FLSA, and that Defendants failed to pay them wages and overtime for time they worked. Manning, 725 F.3d at 48. The FLSA provides a formula for computing overtime wages based on the employee’s regular rate of pay. See 29 U.S.C.A. § 207(a). Plaintiffs argue that the law does not require them to first grieve and arbitrate any aspect of any claim made under the FLSA but also that the meaning of the terms Defendants say are disputed and whose definitions need to be grieved and arbitrated prior to litigating any federal claim are not actually in dispute. Defendants rely heavily on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals decision in Vadino v. A. Valey Engineers, where that court held that exhaustion was required where the FLSA claim seeking more money under the CBA was “entirely dependent” on the CBA’s terms. 903 F.2d 258, 266 (8d Cir. 1990). The Court declines to follow Vadino’s very case-specific holding for two reasons, one practical and one factual. First, Vadino was decided outside the First Circuit and, as such, does not provide this Court with a guiding precedent. Second, the facts are not comparable; the plaintiff in Vadino argued that the defendant violated the CBA by failing to pay him the journeyman’s rate as defined in the CBA and the overtime rate commensurate with that rate. See Urbani, 2016 WL 6571247, at *5 (finding Vadino inapplicable). Plaintiffs here are not disputing their pay rate but claiming that Defendants’ failure to properly account for time worked and to include all their differential pay in its calculation of their regular rates resulted in Defendants paying them less than 1.5 times their regular rates for overtime hours. Thus, by not paying them “at a rate not less than one and one-half times the regular rate at which [they are] employed,” 29 U.S.C. § 207(a)(1), Plaintiffs claim that Defendants violated the FSLA. The Third Circuit’s reasoning in Vadino does not suit the facts alleged here. The First Circuit has noted that “[rlights conferred by Congress are conceptually distinct from those created by private agreement, and there is no authority for the proposition that rights under the FLSA merge into contractual ones whenever the two overlap.” O’Brien, 350 F.3d at 284-285 (court rejected the proposition that union workers’ FLSA claims were “barred from federal court because

³ While considering a retaliation claim may not necessarily require interpretation of the CBAs, the Court finds support in the case law that this claim should also be preempted. The RIWPA states that “[t]his chapter shall not be construed to diminish or impair the rights of a person under any collective bargaining agreement.” R.I. Gen. Laws § 28-50-6. In three cases where plaintiffs alleged retaliation, the First Circuit decided that a similar provision in a different statute mandates section 301 preemption where it concluded that the existence of that employee shifts, salary schedules, shift differentials, wage deductions, incentive pay, and when employees can take meal breaks during their shifts. It is obvious that resolution of Plaintiffs’ state statutory claims based on allegations that Defendants made automatic time deductions for meal breaks, manual time deductions for meal breaks and other reasons, failed to pay them bridge pay, and retaliated against them are dependent on an interpretation of the CBAs’ terms and on the labor relationship between Plaintiffs and Defendants. Cavallaro, 678 F.3d at 8 (whether wages are owed implicated “peculiarities of industry-specific wage and benefit structures” found in the CBA so required interpretation); Rose v. RIN Fed. Credit Union, 1 F.4th 56, 63 (1st Cir. 2021) (meal periods and overtime); Adames v. Exec. Airlines, Inc., 258 F.3d 7, 14-15 (1st Cir. 2001) (meal periods and overtime); Hamilton v. Partners Healthcare Sys., 209 F. Supp. 3d 397, 410 (D. Mass. 2016) (underpayment of wages and overtime). Therefore, the Court finds that Plaintiffs’ state law claims against Defendants are preempted under § 301 and Counts 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, and 8 are dismissed. statutory provision referencing rights under the CBA would require courts to interpret the CBA to determine whether such an agreement is consistent with the rights granted under the CBA. See Lydon v. Boston Sand & Gravel Co., 175 F.3d 6, 11 (1st Cir. 1999); Martin v. Shaw’s Supermarkets, Inc., 105 F.3d 40, 44 (1st Cir. 1997); Magerer v. John Sexton Co., 912 F.2d 525, 529-30 (1st Cir. 1990). ry

⁴ Defendants alternatively move to dismiss Count 9 because they argue the retaliation allegations are not plausible. Defendants lob several arguments not only as to timeliness and appropriateness under the statutes of some of Plaintiffs’ retaliation allegations but also that some of the allegations are too conclusory. At this stage of the litigation taking their allegations in the light most favorable to Plaintiffs, the Court finds that their retaliation claim is sufficient to put Defendants on notice of the conduct at issue and therefore states a claim.

⁵ Defendants also moved on Count 8 for failure to state a claim, but the Court will not address the argument as to that count because it has already dismissed it.