The Holidays Came Early for Employers 2019-12-19T10:05:03-07:00

Posted on December 19, 2019

Employers rejoice! The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) released a string of rulings on Monday reversing three controversial Obama-era decisions. With these rulings, the NLRB returned to long-standing rules in areas of significance prior to the sweeping changes made by the Obama-era Board. The NLRB’s return to the “old” tests should again provide employers with the clarity necessary to determine their legal obligations.

The NLRB in Caesars Entertainment d/b/a Rio All-Suites Hotel and Casino, 368 NLRB No. 143 (Dec. 16, 2019), found that the casino’s policy barring use of its email system for nonbusiness purposes did not violate federal labor law. This decision overruled Purple Communications, where the Obama-era Board had found employees could generally use their employers’ email systems to organize or engage in union or other concerted activities protected by Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act. Caesars reinstates the standard announced in Register Guard, 351 NLRB 1110 (2007), where employees have no statutory right to use employer equipment, including IT resources, for Section 7 purposes. Caesars, however, established an exception to the Register Guard standard “in those rare cases where the employer’s email system furnishes the only reasonable means for employees to communicate with one another.”

The NLRB also issued Apogee Retail LLC, 368 NLRB No. 144 (Dec. 16, 2019), overruling Banner Health System and finding that employers do not violate workers’ rights to act collectively when employers bar employees from discussing workplace investigations. The Board found that invoking confidentiality for workplace investigations is generally legal as long as it is limited to the period of active investigation. The Board applied its 2017 decision, Boeing Co., 365 NLRB No. 154 (2017), to find that investigative confidentiality rules fall with the “Boeing Category 1” rules.

Finally, the NLRB issued Valley Hospital Medical Center, Inc. dba Valley Hospital Medical Center, 368 NLRB No. 139 (Dec. 16, 2019), which reinstated the principle that dues checkoff ends with the expiration of a collective bargaining agreement. This decision overruled the NLRB’s 2015 decision in Lincoln Lutheran of Racine, that a union can continue to insist on dues checkoff post-expiration. The Board returned to the rule of Bethlehem Steel, which had stood for half a century, that employers do not have to facilitate a union’s finances if there is no collective bargaining agreement in place.

EEOC Weighs In On NLRB Protections For Offensive Statements 2019-11-11T11:16:34-07:00

Posted on November 11, 2019

By James Korte

Recently, the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”) invited the public to file amicus briefs regarding the treatment of “profane outbursts and offensive statements of a racial or sexual nature.” Gen. Motors LLC & Charles Robinson, 368 NLRB No. 68 (Sept. 5, 2019). The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) accepted the invitation.

The EEOC and NLRB have similar duties to protect employees’ rights, but the two government agencies treat employees’ use of hostile or offensive language differently. See John Alan Doran, NLRB Benchslap: Enabling Racism/Sexism (Sept. 20, 2016). Numerous NLRB decisions have held that a worker’s use of racial slurs may be protected concerted activity. See, e.g., Detroit Newspapers, 342 NLRB 223, 268-69 (2004). The EEOC says that the use of racial slurs, depending on the circumstances, may violate Title VII. In its Brief, the EEOC focused on the employer’s obligation to prevent and correct harassment in the workplace, which serves the primary objective of Title VII “to avoid harm.” See Faragher v. City of Boca Raton, 524 U.S. 775, 806 (1998). Ultimately, the EEOC urged that this objective is best served “by encouraging employees to complain of harassing conduct even before it become[s] actionable, so that employers can prevent an actionable hostile work environment.” While the EEOC did not take a definitive position on what standard the NLRB should adopt, it did advise the NLRB to consider a standard that allows employers to take action to correct forms of communication that violate Title VII or other antidiscrimination statutes, even though the communication might be protected concerted activity.

The EEOC does not always look at issues from the employer’s point of view, but its amicus brief shows that it understands the “catch-22” that employers face when attempting to protect an employee’s rights before the NLRB, while also keeping the workplace free of discrimination and harassment. It will be interesting to see how the NLRB addresses the EEOC’s concern, and whether it changes its standards.

Board Affirms Reasonable Employer Policies on Confidentiality and Media Contact 2019-10-18T09:58:18-06:00

Posted on October 18, 2019

By Carissa Davis

Last week, the National Labor Relations Board (“Board”) held that employer policies that prohibit disclosure of confidential and proprietary information, and certain media contact rules are lawful under the National Labor Relations Act (“NLRA”). LA Specialty Produce Co., 368 NLRB No. 93 (2019).

In Boeing Co., 365 NLRB No 154 (2017), the Board held that facially neutral rules may be invalidated only if an objectively reasonable employee would interpret the rule to interfere with his exercise of §7 protected rights. This decision established a new more forgiving standard for reviewing facially neutral rules and policies.

Confidentiality: In LA Specialty Produce, a produce distributor had a decades old confidentiality policy mandating employees to protect confidential and proprietary information, including client vendor lists. The Union argued, and the Administrative Law Judge agreed, that the rule prevented employees from disclosing customer and vendor names to their labor organization, and so, chilled protected activity. But the Board reversed, stating that it was unable to perceive how the language, when reasonably read could interfere with protected rights. The Board noted that employees have the right to appeal to third parties, including employer’s vendors and customers, in support of labor disputes, but that this right does not permit employees to divulge information that the employer may lawfully conceal.

Although the rule in question prohibited the disclosure of confidential client and vendor lists, accounting records, production processes, and business operations, it did not go so far as to prohibit employees from speaking to clients and vendors and it did not apply to information such as employee salary and wages. Accordingly, the Board held, as a general rule, confidentiality policies prohibiting employees from disclosing customer and vendor lists are lawful under the Boeing test.

Media Contact: In addition to the confidentiality challenge, the Board considered the company’s media contact rule providing that, when employees are approached for comment by the media, they cannot provide information on behalf of the company- only the President is authorized to comment. Although §7 generally protects employees when speaking to the media, there is no NLRA right permitting employees to speak on behalf of their employer. (See, e.g., Valley Hospital Medical Center, 351 NLRB 1250 (2007)). When reasonably interpreted as required by Boeing, the rule only prohibits employees from responding to media interviews on behalf of their employer, it does not prohibit any and all media contact. Thus, confidentiality rules of the sort pass muster under the Boeing standard.

The slip opinion for LA Specialty Produce Co., is 368 NLRB No. 93.

The NLRB Has You Covered…By The Contract 2019-09-11T13:55:26-06:00

Posted on September 11, 2019

By Patrick Scully

In another stunning and sweeping decision, The National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”) has overturned the “clear and unmistakable” waiver test and concluded that employers may make unilateral changes to terms and conditions of employment “covered” by an existing collective bargaining agreement.

For decades, employers had negotiated lengthy “management rights clauses” into collective bargaining agreements only to have the NLRB strike down a change made by the employer by finding that the union did not “clearly and unmistakably” waive its right to bargain about the change. For example, if an agreement indicated that an employer could issue and amend policies and rules, the NLRB would usually find a violation of National Labor Relations Act (“NLRA” or “Act”), unless the Board found that waiver “sufficiently specific” to encompass the change. In other words, employers would negotiate what they believed was an effective waiver, only to have their bargain disrupted by the union filing an unfair labor practice charge.

Under the new test, employers will be able to rely on a defense that the objected-to change was covered by the language of the collective bargaining agreement. In such cases, the Board will now “give effect to the plain meaning of the relevant contractual language” and find a change covered if it “falls within the compass or scope of contract language that grants the employer the right to act unilaterally.”

The significance of the NLRB’s decision is best encapsulated by dissenting Member McFerran’s characterization of it: “The implication of the majority’s new standard is clear: If a management-rights provision in a collective bargaining agreement is sufficiently general, it will permit an employer to act unilaterally with respect to any specific term or condition of employment that plausibly fits within the general subject matters of the provision.”

MV Transportation, Inc., 368 NLRB No. 66 (September 10, 2019).

NLRB Enhances Its View of Property Rights 2019-09-06T17:13:53-06:00

Posted on September 6, 2019

By Patrick Scully

The National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”) has settled a long-brewing controversy over what constitutes “discrimination” with respect to non-employee access to employer property. Twenty years ago, the Board held in Sandusky Mall, 329 NLRB 618 (1999), that an employer discriminates against non-employee union representatives if it bars them from its property while permitting access to charitable and civic organizations.

The Sandusky decision was widely criticized in the United States Courts of Appeals. The decision also put employers in the unenviable position of weighing the legal risk of permitting the Girls Scouts and Salvation Army on their property. Today, the NLRB finally overruled Sandusky and adopted a definition of discrimination that accords with the prevailing view in the federal courts.

Now the NLRB will only find that an employer has discriminated in its denial of access to union representatives if it permits access to other organizations for similar types of activities. The Board no longer considers charitable, civic, and commercial activities to be similar to nonemployee union organizational activities. In applying its new rule to the case at hand, the NLRB found that Kroger did NOT discriminate when it barred non-employees urging a boycott of Kroger while permitting various charitable and civic entities on its property. In dissent, Member McFerran complained that the majority is issuing a series of cases making “it increasingly easy” for employers to exclude union organizers from property “open to the public”.

Kroger Mid-Atlantic, 368 NLRB No. 64 (September 6, 2019).

NLRB Serves Up An Epic Ruling For Employers 2019-08-15T10:20:02-06:00

Posted on August 15, 2019

By Patrick Scully

In its first significant decision applying the Supreme Court’s holding in Epic Systems v. NLRB, 584 U.S. ____, 138 S.Ct. 1612 (2018), the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”) ruled that a restaurant owner lawfully compelled its employees to sign a revised mandatory arbitration agreement.

The employer, an operator of Latin-themed restaurants in the Houston area, required its employees to sign a revised arbitration agreement prohibiting them from opting into a class or collective wage and hour action. The employer issued the revised agreement because several employees had opted into such a wage action and the employer’s prior arbitration agreement only prohibited employees from filing class or collective actions.

The Board noted, in light of Epic Systems, that it was simply not unlawful under the National Labor Relations Act (“Act”) for an employer to require its employees to waive their right to file or opt into class or collective wage and hour actions. Accordingly, it was not unlawful for the restaurant owner to insist on its revised agreement as a condition of employment. Although it was clear that the employer imposed the new agreement in response to employees participating in the wage and hour action, the NLRB reasoned that the employer did not retaliate, because the new agreement did not actually restrict any activity protected by Section 7 of the Act.

Dissenting Board Member McFerran took issue primarily with this last point, noting that the NLRB has historically found that a facially valid work rule must be struck down if it is promulgated in response to “protected” (Section 7) activity. Member McFerran disagreed with the majority that this precedent only applied to rules that imposed restrictions on union or other protected activity. By suggesting that the Board’s decision “departs from Board precedent without explanation”, the dissent provided a recipe for the restaurant owner’s employees to appeal the decision.

Cordua Restaurants, Inc. 368 NLRB No. 43 (August 14, 2019)

NLRB Body Blow: Union’s Lobbying Not Chargeable To Nonmember Employees 2019-03-01T17:45:58-07:00

Posted on March 1, 2019

By Patrick Scully

The National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”) has ruled that unions cannot charge nonmember represented employees for union lobbying expenses. Under the Supreme Court’s decision in Communication Workers v. Beck, 487 U.S. 735 (1988), nonmember represented employees can only be charged “representational fees” in states that permit ‘union security’ (compelled payment of dues as a condition of employment). In other words, employees who do not wish to join a union can be prevented from becoming so-called ‘free riders’ because the union that represents them can collect fees “necessary to performing the duties of an exclusive representative of the employees in dealing with the employer on labor management issues.” On March 1, 2019, The NLRB concluded that, under the Beck standard, a union representing nurses in Rhode Island and Vermont could not charge nonmember nurses for the union’s lobbying efforts on seven bills. In short, the Board found that the fact that some of the bills related to employment issues did not demonstrate that the lobbying was necessary for the union to perform its statutory function as the employees’ representative. In a signature dissent low on case law and high on righteous indignation, Member McFerran argued that a union should be able to prove how certain lobbying might be “germane” to collective bargaining. This legal argument was previously considered and rejected by the District of Columbia Circuit Court Appeals, consistent with established Supreme Court precedent.

United Nurses and Allied Professionals (Kent Hospital), 367 NLRB No. 94 (March 1, 2019)

The Changed NLRB Reasonably Defines “Change” 2017-12-18T09:15:42-07:00

Posted on December 18, 2017

By Patrick Scully

The new National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”) reversed another Obama Board decision on Friday. In Raytheon Company, 365 NLRB No. 161 (December 15, 2017), the Board returned to long standing precedent that the question of whether an employer has made a “change” should take into consideration the employer’s standing practices. The Obama Board had rejected that interpretation in E.I. du Pont de Nemours, Louisville Works, 355 NLRB 1084 (2010), when it held that because a practice was not set forth in the parties’ collective bargaining agreement, the employer could not continue to exercise the practice after expiration of the agreement. The new NLRB disagreed, finding the DuPont decision inconsistent with the long-standing “commonsense” definition of what is actually a “change” in employees’ terms and conditions of employment. Accordingly, Raytheon was free to make its usual adjustments to health benefits as it had in prior plan years. It was not required to provide the union with notice and an opportunity to bargain the practice simply because the agreement expired.

NLRB Gets New General Counsel, Employers Exhale 2017-11-09T17:40:56-07:00

Posted on November 9, 2017

By Patrick Scully

On November 8, 2017, the United States Senate confirmed the President’s nomination of Peter Robb as General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board. GC Robb will replace Richard Griffin, whose tenure was marked by aggressive prosecution and attempts to expand the scope of the NLRB’s jurisdiction. Notably, GC Griffin launched a new “joint employer” theory, repeatedly prosecuted employers for maintaining allegedly unlawful rules, attempted to expand the definition of “employee”, and greatly increased the use of injunctions and extraordinary remedies against employers. GC Robb is largely expected to take a more balanced approach to enforcement of the law. Mr. Robb is a former Board Attorney and former Chief Counsel to NLRB Member Hunter. Mr. Robb has had a distinguished career as a management-side labor lawyer, is a long-standing member of the NLRB Practice and Procedure Committee, and is widely respected. Employers are hopeful that GC Robb will immediately scale back former GC Griffin’s more controversial initiatives, but it is unlikely that the new General Counsel will take any steps to alter the course of cases already in the administrative/court process.

Racist Picket Conduct Protected 2017-08-09T16:16:42-06:00

Posted on August 9, 2017

By Bill Wright

The NLRB holds – famously now – that sexist and racist conduct on a picket line is protected from adverse action unless the conduct is also violent and coercive. Despite a shot across its bow in Consolidated Communications, Inc. v. NLRB, (D.C. Cir. 2016), the Board continues to force employers to ignore sexist and racist conduct, and the courts continue to defer to the NLRB on the issue.

In Cooper Tire & Runner Co. v. NLRB, No. 1602721 (8th Cir. August 8, 2017), a picketer yelled racist comments at a van carrying strike-breaking workers. Some number of the strike breakers were African American, and the picketer yelled references to fried chicken and watermelon. When the strike and lockout ended, the company did not hire the picketer back, citing his conduct as unrelated to the picketing activity. An arbitrator found the termination to be for good cause, but the NLRB disagreed, overruled the arbitrator, and found an unfair labor practice. The court agreed with the board. The picketer had his hands in his pockets, and there was no evidence the employees in the van heard the comments or felt threatened or coerced.

The call for the NLRB to recognize public standards of employee civility, even in strike conduct, grows however. In Consolidated Communication, the criticism of the Board’s policy came in a concurring opinion. In Cooper Tire, Sr. Judge C. Arlen Beam dissented altogether. Judge Beam called for the NLRB to recognize that “the racial epithets expelled by [the picketer] were not simply tolerated, impulsive behavior. They were expressions that tended to coerce and intimidate African American employees in the exercise of rights protected under the Act.”

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