Facts
The complainant, [O.] , had been working as a pool attendant at the [X.] pool of the city of St. Gallen since May 1, 2001. He was employed with a 60 percent workload under public law. In June 2005, his supervisor complained about a violation of water surveillance duties. From March 1 to April 30, 2006, [O.] took vacation and then a month of unpaid leave. Two working days before his scheduled return to work, he had a friend inform that his return would be delayed by three to four weeks due to an accident he had in Lebanon.
The city's personnel office refused to continue the contractually agreed-upon employment as a pool attendant and gave [O.] the opportunity to comment on the intended dissolution of the service relationship by the end of June 2007. The School and Sports Directorate of the city of St. Gallen terminated the service relationship with a decision of March 30, 2007, effective June 30, 2007, because various incidents had destroyed the trust relationship to such an extent that continuing the service relationship was no longer tolerable.
[O.] appealed the termination, which the St. Gallen City Council rejected with a decision of June 24, 2008. [O.] then appealed to the Department of the Interior of the canton of St. Gallen, which rejected the appeal with a decision of January 23, 2009. [O.] filed a complaint, which the Administrative Court of the canton of St. Gallen rejected with a decision of August 19, 2009.
Considerations
The Federal Court examined the admissibility of the complaint and came to the conclusion that the amount in dispute reached the required threshold of 15,000 francs. The court found that the complaint was admissible in the area of public-law employment relationships.
The Federal Court reviewed the complainant's objections to the facts and came to the conclusion that they were not justified. The court found that the lower court had not made its findings of fact in an arbitrary manner or in violation of a cantonal procedural provision.
The Federal Court examined the question of…