PeterWK's Periodical

Victory at the Anchorage Sheraton

February 13, 2012

On February 3, US District Court Judge Timothy M. Burgess granted a 10(J) preliminary injunction as authorized under the National Labor Relations Act, ordering the Sheraton Hotel in Anchorage to recognize and bargain with UNITE HERE Local 878. This order was wide-reaching and included many significant issues for the workers at the hotel, which is owned by Ashford and operated by Remington Lodging and Hospitality. The judge ruled that Remington has engaged in a wide range of unlawful activities, including:

• Unilaterally assigning non-union security work to bargaining unit members.
• Failing to notify the FMCS of the existence of a contract dispute and provide 30 days’ notice prior to making unilateral changes.
• Using Employer handbook rules to preclude workers from exercising section 7 rights under the NLRA.
• Disciplining, suspending or discharging workers for engaging in protected Union activities.
• Confiscating Union buttons.
• Prematurely declaring impasse and failing to negotiate with the Union.
• Coercing workers into signing a petition seeking to decertify the Union.
• Denigrated the Union in the eyes of workers.
• Improperly withdrawing Union recognition.
• Making unlawful unilateral changes in workers’ terms and conditions of employment.

The Judge’s order directed Remington to:  

• Recognize and bargain with the Union.
• At the direction of the Union, return to the Union medical and pension benefits.
• Reduce the room quota for housekeepers from 17 to 15.
• Start paying for employees’ meal breaks.
• Stop charging employees for meals.
• Follow seniority scheduling practices.
• Allow the Union and its representatives access to the hotel.
• Within 20 days, hold mandatory employee meetings and read the Judge’s order to employees, or in the presence of management, have an NLRB Agent read the document.

The struggle with the Anchorage Sheraton began in December 2008, and since that time the employer has attempted to put up every possible obstacle to the workers achieving a fair contract. While the struggle continues, this is a major victory for the members of Local 878.

This decision stems from two complaints issued by the NLRB General Counsel against Remington. A third complaint is scheduled for hearing later this month, and the NLRB is investigating approximately 30 additional unfair labor practice charges filed by the Union.

Federal judge orders Anchorage hotel to recognize and bargain with union

Wanna see some management/business class bullshit?  Read this:

From the National Labor Relations Board.

A U.S. District Court judge has ordered the Sheraton Hotel in Anchorage, Alaska to recognize and bargain with its employees’ union representative of over thirty years after two years of increasingly tense relations that included a host of egregious unfair labor practice conduct by the Hotel, including its suspensionand discharge of Union supporters, unilateral changes in the employees’ terms and conditions of employment, prematurely declaring impasse in negotiations,  and ultimately withdrawing recognition of the Union.

The preliminary injunction granted today by Judge Timothy M. Burgess will remain in effect until the NLRB’s administrative process is complete. Judge Burgess found that the NLRB was likely to prevail in its continued proceedings against the hotel, and that failing to issue an injunction at this point could cause irreparable harm to the employees and the public interest.

The NLRB Acting General Counsel has issued three complaints against the hotel, owned by Remington Lodging and Hospitality, since the dispute began in the summer of 2009, when the previous labor contract with UNITE HERE Local 878 was due to expire.   Two of those complaints were tried before an administrative law judge over the course of 6 months beginning in August of 2010; the third is pending hearing, currently scheduled for later this month.

As alleged, the hotel prematurely declared negotiations had reached impasse and began to unilaterally change terms of work, including raising the number of rooms to be cleaned per shift, eliminating paid meal breaks, and changing health insurance providers. When workers presented hotel managers with a boycott petition, several were suspended or fired. (They were later reinstated.) Hotel managers also unlawfully coerced employees into signing a petition to decertify the union, then ceased recognizing the union and stopped making payments to its pension plan.

Judge Burgess ordered the hotel to stop the unlawful activity, restore all prior contract terms, and enter into negotiations with the union if requested. Additionally, the order must be read to employees in English and Spanish by a high-level hotel official or by an NLRB employee in the hotel official’s presence.

Susannah Merritt litigated the injunction on behalf of the Petitioner, retired Regional Director Richard Ahearn of the Seattle office, on behalf of the National Labor Relations Board.  She was joined on the papers by Mara-Louise Anzalone, who represented the Acting General Counsel in the administrative trial of the first two complaints, and Anne Pomerantz, the Regional Attorney.

House GOP looks to bust unions

@AFLCIO @UAW - The anti-worker Republicans are at it again.  Slandering unions, the NLRB, and my profession (union organizing) in attempt to push another anti-union bill.  This time on the Federal level.  They want to force unions to have a vote every 3 years to exist, force unions to stay out of politics, and increase penalties against unions that break labor law, citing intimidation by union organizers.  The Republican disconnect from what working families want and need continues…

Found out about this via Steven Greenhouse’s twitter: @greenhousenyt

From The Washington Times:

Legislation would require workers to reaffirm unions with votes every 3 years

In an effort to loosen labor’s grip on workers, two GOP lawmakers want legislation that would require workers to re-affirm the existence of their unions with new votes every three years.

Sen. Orrin G. Hatch of Utah and Rep. Tim Scott of South Carolina are pushing the Employee Rights Act that also would place limits on strikes, how fast a union can organize and how membership fees may be used to support political candidates. The bill has yet to receive a committee hearing in either chamber.

“It’s neither anti-union, nor pro-employer,” Mr. Hatch told The Washington Times. “It’s pro-worker.”

The move comes as unions are showing new signs of a turnaround in growth. The number of members spiked by about 50,000 workers to nearly 14.8 million in 2011, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That follows two years of declining membership, during which unions lost nearly 1.4 million workers.

Conservative groups are joining in the fight to handicap unions. The Center for Union Facts recently started running a $10 million campaign to promote the bill. The advertisements are running in the District and were aired nationally on Fox News during the South Carolina presidential primary debate.

Supporters of the bill are taking a new approach. Rather than pitting unions against businesses, they are spinning it as unions against workers.

“There’s not a single provision in this bill that will empower employers at the expense of the union,” Mr. Hatch said. “The only parties whose position will be improved by the Employee Rights Act are employees.”

They paint a picture of workers in the middle of a spectrum, surrounded by businesses on the right and unions on the left.

“It’s about time we start worrying about the employees and the workers, rather than unions and management people,” Mr. Hatch said. “It is fair to both employers and unions, and, far more importantly, it’s fair to workers.”

Secret-ballot elections, instead of card checks, would be the voting method of choice under the Employee Rights Act, which was introduced last August in both chambers.

Few workers - less than 10 percent of union members - vote to organize. Instead, most workers join an existing union as a condition of employment.

This bill, however, would give workers a chance to voice their opinions. Union officials would be up for re-election every three years. At that time, employees could decide whether to keep or eliminate their union.

“My goal is to make sure that employees of a company make the decision on joining unions,” Mr. Scott said. “This just gives them an opportunity to say, ‘Yes, I want to be a part of the union.’ “

“Voters get to choose senators every six years, they decide on the president every four years, and on me every two years,” he said. “To me, it makes sense that union members should decide on their leaders at least every three years.”

Mr. Hatch agreed.

“I think the right of an individual to not join a union is just as essential as the right to unionize,” he said.

In the instances of nonunion workplaces that want to organize, the bill would require a minimum of 40 days between the time a petition is filed and a vote is taken. That would give employees time to hear from both unions and employers before they decide.

This provision comes in response to the National Labor Relations Board’s recent decision to speed up union elections, including in some cases to less than 10 days.

“Nobody has enough time in 10 days to decide the benefits and the negatives of joining a union,” Mr. Scott said.

The bill would also combat strikes. It would streamline the federal process, requiring a majority of union members to approve a strike.

“Strikes can be damaging,” Mr. Hatch said. “Employees lose work and may not get back to work. Shouldn’t they at least have a chance to vote on whether to go on strike?”

He pointed out that strike funds, which provide financial assistance to union members during work stoppages, rarely pay more than 20 percent of an employee’s salary. And they usually have to be actively involved in the strike, such as on the picket line, to get that money.

Unions also would be required to receive written consent from each member before donating portions of their membership fees to political candidates. This would be determined individually, member by member, so some members could agree to support a certain candidate, and others could decide against it. Their money would be split up.

Union membership is split fairly evenly between Democrats (49 percent) and Republicans (47 percent). But 93 percent of campaign contributions go to Democratic candidates.

“I’d like anyone who would oppose this provision to explain to me why it is fair to force workers to contribute to political campaigns at all, regardless of the party on the receiving end,” Mr. Hatch told the Senate when he introduced the bill in August.

The penalities would also be updated, so unions that violate labor laws are held to the same disciplinary measures as businesses that do so.

“We’ve all heard the accounts of unions obtaining signatures through deception and intimidation,” Mr. Hatch said.

The AFL-CIO and SEIU did not respond to requests for comment.

NLRB delivers a commonsense decision in D.R. Horton case

Late last week, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued a decision in D.R. Horton, Inc., ruling that companies cannot prevent employees from bringing workplace grievances as a class in all judicial venues under mandatory arbitration agreements.

The decision didn’t come as much of a shock to anyone familiar with the details of the case. Under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), employees have full freedom to come together and engage in concerted activity to address workplace concerns. In clear violation of the Act, D.R. Horton enforced its arbitration agreement by dividing a group of workers facing overtime violations into single units. In other words, workers had to seek justice as individuals rather than as a group—even though they shared the same complaint against their employer.

As our Executive Director Kimberly Freeman Brown pointed out in her statement,

[W]hen a company refuses to allow workers to join together to arbitrate claims, it raises the costs to individual employees, dissuades other employees from following through with their claims, and increases the likelihood that workers will be coerced during the process. In other words, the balance of power shifts even more toward lawbreaking corporations.

Particularly in these tough economic times, it’s critical that we protect workers’ right to join together to improve their workplace. And the NLRB’s decision in this case brings us one step closer to that goal.

Chart of the Day: Presidential Recess Appointments

How Boeing got away with breaking the law

Josh Eidelson is a freelance journalist and a contributor at The American Prospect and In These Times. After receiving his MA in Political Science, he worked as a union organizer for five years.More Josh Eidelson

NLRB Speeds up Union elections!

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/22/business/nlrb-adopts-rules-to-speed-unionization-votes.html

Nice! Basically the rule changes will put most of the legal mumbo jumbo that employers use to delay union elections for months after the election. Then it can all be sorted out afterword. This will shorten the time that employers will have to bring in union busting law firms that help intimidate workers and violate labor law while muddying the waters of an election process with frivolous delays.

I dunno why the Chamber of Commerce is against this. It’ll save businesses money. Now instead of companies hiring $1,000-a-day lawyers from union busting firms like Jackson Lewis for months and months at a time, it’ll be more like two months or less. :)

—

NLRB: In recent years, only about 10 percent of NLRB election cases have gone through the hearing process. Such elections have been held on average 101 days after the election petition was filed with a regional office.

“This rule is about giving all employees who have petitioned for an election the right to vote in a timely manner and without the impediment of needless litigation,” said Chairman Pearce.
http://www.nlrb.gov/news/board-adopts-amendments-election-case-procedures

Killing the right to organize

UNLESS something changes in Washington, American workers will, on New Year’s Day, effectively lose their right to be represented by a union. Two of the five seats on the National Labor Relations Board, which protects collective bargaining, are vacant, and on Dec. 31, the term of Craig Becker, a labor lawyer whom President Obama named to the board last year through a recess appointment, will expire. Without a quorum, the Supreme Court ruled last year, the board cannot decide cases.

What would this mean?

Workers illegally fired for union organizing won’t be reinstated with back pay. Employers will be able to get away with interfering with union elections. Perhaps most important, employers won’t have to recognize unions despite a majority vote by workers. Without the board to enforce labor law, most companies will not voluntarily deal with unions.

If this nightmare comes to pass, it will represent the culmination of three decades of Republican resistance to the board — an unwillingness to recognize the fundamental right of workers to band together, if they wish, to seek better pay and working conditions. But Mr. Obama is also partly to blame; in trying to install partisan stalwarts on the board, as his predecessors did, he is all but guaranteeing that the impasse will continue. On Wednesday, he announced his intention to nominate two pro-union lawyers to the board, though there is no realistic chance that either can gain Senate confirmation anytime soon.

For decades after its creation in 1935, the board was a relatively fair arbiter between labor and capital. It has protected workers’ right to organize by, among other things, overseeing elections that decide on union representation. Employers may not engage in unfair labor practices, like intimidating organizers and discriminating against union members. Unions are prohibited, too, from doing things like improperly pressuring workers to join.

The system began to run into trouble in the 1970s. Employers found loopholes that enabled them to delay the board’s administrative proceedings, sometimes for years. Reforms intended to speed up the board’s resolution of disputes have repeatedly foundered in Congress.

The precipitous decline of organized labor — principally a result of economic forces, not legal ones — cemented unions’ dependence on the board, despite its imperfections. Meanwhile, business interests, represented by an increasingly conservative Republican Party, became more assertive in fighting unions.

The board became dysfunctional. Traditionally, members were career civil servants or distinguished lawyers and academics from across the country. But starting in the Reagan era, the board’s composition began to tilt toward Washington insiders like former Congressional staff members and former lobbyists.

Starting with a compromise that allowed my confirmation in 1994, the board’s members and general counsel have been nominated in groups. In contrast to the old system, the new “batching” meant that nominees were named as a package acceptable to both parties. As a result, the board came to be filled with rigid ideologues. Some didn’t even have a background in labor law.

Under President George W. Bush, the board all but stopped using its discretion to obtain court orders against employers before the board’s own, convoluted, administrative process was completed — a power that, used fairly, is a crucial protection for workers. In 2007, in what has been called the September Massacre, the board issued rulings that made it easier for employers to block union organizing and harder for illegally fired employees to collect back pay. Democratic senators then blocked Mr. Bush from making recess appointments to the board, as President Bill Clinton had done. For 27 months, until March 2010, the board operated with only two members; in June 2010, the Supreme Court ruled that it needed at least three to issue decisions.

Under Mr. Obama, the board has begun to take enforcement more seriously, by pursuing the court orders that the board under Mr. Bush had abandoned. Sadly, though, the board has also been plagued by unnecessary controversy. In April, the acting general counsel issued a complaint over Boeing’s decision to build airplanes at a nonunion plant in South Carolina, following a dispute with Boeing machinists in Washington State. Although the complaint was dropped last week after the machinists reached a new contract agreement with Boeing, the controversy reignited Republican threats to cut financing for the board.

In my view, the complaint against Boeing was legally flawed, but the threats to cut the board’s budget represent unacceptable political interference. The shenanigans continue: last month, before the board tentatively approved new proposals that would expedite unionization elections, the sole Republican member threatened to resign, which would have again deprived the board of a quorum.

Mr. Obama needs to make this an election-year issue; if the board goes dark in January, he should draw attention to Congressional obstructionism during the campaign and defend the board’s role in protecting employees and employers. A new vision for labor-management cooperation must include not only a more powerful board, but also a less partisan one, with members who are independent and neutral experts. Otherwise, the partisan morass will continue, and American workers will suffer.

Republicans not letting up on NLRB

Republicans still out to get one of the few sections of the government that actually helps workers (most of the time).  The NLRB’s case against Boeing has been dropped after the IAMAW (Machinists) struck a new deal with Boeing that keeps 737 production at the Washington plant, avoiding another strike.  I think the Machinists should have kept the case against Boeing, but I can understand why they would want to settle.  The whole thing is over, and everyone seems to have gotten what they wanted:  Boeing gets a new non union plant in shithole ‘right to work’ for less South Carolina for the 757, the 737 will still be made by IAMAW workers in Washington State, and the NLRB dropped the investigation of Boeing moving it’s plant to bust the Machinists.  This isn’t enough for the Republicans who are on a witch hunt against Obama NLRB appointees.  All the while their ball-less hack conservative on the board is looking to jump ship just so the NLRB cannot be functional and decided cases, crippling the board and setting back union elections everywhere.

—————————————-

Congressional Republicans are still on the attack against the National Labor Relations Board – even though the agency dropped a case against Boeing that had become a rallying cry for conservatives.

A clearly unsatisfied Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), one of the loudest congressional critics of the NLRB, on Friday called for an investigation into the labor board. And Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), who had subpoenaed the board for information on the NLRB-Boeing fight, said Friday that his House Oversight and Government Reform Committee wouldn’t halt the investigation and instead continue to seek information into the labor board’s actions.

“NLRB’s record of rogue action and lack of transparency with the public and Congress in this case – and in others – has raised serious questions that remain unanswered,” Issa said in a statement.

Earlier Friday, the NLRB announced that the dispute between it and Boeing had officially ended – a move that was widely expected after a Boeing Machinists union voted earlier this week to approve a four-year extension of its contract.

The battle began in April, when the labor board sued Boeing after the company decided to move a plant from Washington state – where union strikes had halted production of the 787 Dreamliner aircraft – to South Carolina, a right-to-work state.

The NLRB had said Boeing was retaliating against the union for the strikes, and the company had denounced the legal complaint as “legally frivolous” and a “radical departure” from board and Supreme Court precedents.

But on Friday, the fight – at least between the NLRB and Boeing – seemed to end.

“I am pleased that the collective bargaining process has succeeded and that the parties have begun a promising new chapter in their relationship,” said NLRB acting general counsel Lafe Solomon.

Added Boeing in a statement: “We have maintained from the outset that the complaint was without merit and that the best course of action would be for it to be dropped. Today that happened.”

But between congressional Republicans and the NLRB is another matter.

Graham said a congressional investigation was necessary because he had “disturbing questions” whether the labor board — which is supposed to be an independent agency — had worked with the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers union against Boeing.

As for Issa, he noted that the labor board had cited the ongoing legal dispute as a reason that the NLRB hadn’t handed over certain information to the Oversight Committee.

“Now that that is no longer the case, it is incumbent on NLRB to expeditiously hand over all documents and materials required as part of the Committee’s investigation,” he added.

President Obama nominates two to National Labor Relations Board

Oh look, someone who worked for Ted Kennedy and a lawyer from the Operation Engineers.  Odds of their appointments being blocked by the anti worker republicans: 110%

Unless they come from the business side of labor law, the GOP (not Grand Old Party, but Grand Oligarchy Party) will not allow them to have a spot on the board.  They’ve even found ways to block recess appointments.  Obama should try to seat them during the Christmas recess.  I think that’s the idea, but I could be wrong.  Show some fucking backbone Mr. President.  Good choices for appointees though.

———————-

December 15, 2011

Contact:
Office of Public Affairs
202-273-1991
publicinfo@nlrb.gov
www.nlrb.gov

President Barack Obama late Wednesday, Dec. 14, announced his intent to nominate Sharon Block and Richard Griffin as members of the National Labor Relations Board.

Sharon Block is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Congressional Affairs at the U.S. Department of Labor.  Between 2006 and 2009, Ms. Block was Senior Labor and Employment Counsel for the Senate HELP Committee, where she worked for Senator Edward M. Kennedy. Ms. Block previously served at the National Labor Relations Board as senior attorney to Chairman Robert Battista from 2003 to 2006 and as an attorney in the appellate court branch from 1996 to 2003.  From 1994 to 1996, she was Assistant General Counsel at the National Endowment for the Humanities, and from 1991 to 1993, she was an associate at Steptoe & Johnson.  She received a B.A. in History from Columbia University and a J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center where she received the John F. Kennedy Labor Law Award.

Richard Griffin is the General Counsel for International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE).  He also serves on the board of directors for the AFL-CIO Lawyers Coordinating Committee, a position he has held since 1994.  Since 1983, he has held a number of leadership positions with IUOE from Assistant House Counsel to Associate General Counsel.   From 1985 to 1994, Mr. Griffin served as a member of the board of trustees of the IUOE’s central pension fund.  From 1981 to 1983, he served as a Counsel to NLRB Board Members.  Mr. Griffin holds a B.A. from Yale University and a J.D. from Northeastern University School of Law.

The National Labor Relations Board is an independent federal agency vested with the power to safeguard employees’ rights to organize and to determine whether to have unions as their bargaining representative. The agency also acts to prevent and remedy unfair labor practices committed by private sector employers and unions.