Management Memo

The National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”) has ruled in a unanimous decision that it is dismissing the petition filed by the College Athlete Players Association for an election declaring Northwestern University football team members who receive grant-in-aid scholarships are “employees” within the meaning of the National Labor Relations Act (“Act”).  The Board explained that it had concluded that “asserting jurisdiction in this case would not promote stability in labor relations.”  The Board made clear however that it might well assert ...

The National Labor Relations Board has issued an Order (PDF) denying a request for a special appeal filed by McDonald’, USA, LLC and its franchisees (collectively referred to as “McDonald’s” in the Board’s Order) and found that the Administrative Law Judge presiding in the unfair labor practice hearing did not err when she denied McDonald’s motion for a bill of particulars explaining the factual basis for the General Counsel’s claim that McDonald’s, USA, LLC and the named franchisees are joint employers.

The ALJ Had Denied McDonald’s Motion for a Bill of ...

As we have been reporting, the Writers Guild of America East has been actively pursuing writers in the new media arena.   On Friday August 7^th, the Guild announced that Vice had agreed to recognize the Guild as the bargaining representative of its editorial staff without an election. It is reported that there are approximately 80 employees in the unit.

While VICE’s management’ statement this past Friday concerning the Guild’s campaign and demand for recognition left some room for doubt as to whether VICE would recognize the union without an election,  they announced today that ...

One of the hallmark initiatives of NLRB General Counsel Richard F. Griffin Jr. has been the pursuit of more aggressive remedies in response to what the General Counsel considers to be egregious unfair labor practices (“ULP’) activity.  While his predecessors and prior Board members spoke of “special remedies” that they would seek to impose in what they deemed extraordinary cases, General Counsel Griffin and today’s National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”) are much more frequently arguing for and directing remedies that go beyond those that the NLRB ...

U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson on Wednesday issued a 72 page opinion (PDF) rejecting each of the arguments raised by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Retail Federation and other business groups and found that the Amended Election Rules adopted by the National Labor Relations Board in December 2014, which took effect in April 2015, in an action that argued that the Board had exceeded its authority, violated the Administrative Procedures Act and that the Amended Rules were unconstitutional.

This is the second district court decision to reject such challenges ...

On July 10, in Venetian Casino Resort, LLC v. N.L.R.B., the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a resort and casino operator’s call to the Las Vegas Police Department, asking it to take action in response union demonstrators trespass on its private property, was protected by the First Amendment and did not violate the National Labor Relations Act (“Act”). The Court’s decision vacated a decision by the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”), in which the Board found that the act of calling the police in those circumstances unlawfully interfered with ...

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB or Board) invited interested parties to submit amicus briefs in Miller & Anderson, Inc. in connection with the Board’s reexamination of critical issues affecting the ability of unions to organize employees employed by temporary and staffing agencies (“temporary employees”) in the same bargaining units as employees of an employer that supplements its direct workforce with temporary employees.

Elections Involving Joint-Employers

Under the existing law, the Board will only conduct an election and certify a unit that includes ...

In the footsteps of last month’s union election at Gawker, an electronic news site, it has now been reported that all 26 of the writers and editors of San Francisco-based at Salon, another on line news organization, have served the publication with a letter announcing that each of them has designated the News Guild, which until April of this year was known as the Newspaper Guild,  as their collective bargaining representative.

Lowell Peterson the union’s Executive Director commented that the unionization campaigns at Salon and Gawker and a part of the Guild’s broader efforts ...

The National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or “Board”), in its June 26, 2015, Decision and Order in American Baptist Homes of the West d/b/a Piedmont Gardens (PDF) has overruled what it described as a longstanding “blanket exemption” allowing employers to protect the confidentiality of witness statements taken during investigations and not provide them to a union in response to an information request. In place of the long standing body of law protecting the confidentiality of witness statements, which was established in recognition of the needs for ...

Last week we reported on the June 3rd vote by Gawker media’s employees for union representation and speculated what it meant in the broader context of union organizing among Millennials.

Today, Rachel L. Swarns of the New York Times provided some insight based on interviews and reporting with Gawker workers.

The article notes a recent study by the Pew Research Center finding that those in the 18-29 age group view unions more favorably than those in other age groups, with almost twice as many having a favorable view of unions than those who don’t.

Swarns also points out the issues ...

On June 3, 2015 editorial employees at Gawker Media (“Gawker”) voted to be represented by the Writers Guild of America, East ("the Union”).  In this closely watched organizing drive, employees of a leading “new media” outlet, chose an old line print journalism union to bargain with their employer, becoming one of the first (if not the first) digital media outlets to unionize.  This follows on the heels of increased union organizing and pressure in the technology field and organized labor’s Silicon Valley Rising campaign. Interestingly, the election was not conducted by ...

One of two lawsuits challenging the National Labor Relations Board’s authority to issue the expedited election rules that took effect on April 14, 2015, has now been dismissed by Judge Robert L. Pitman of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas in Austin.  In his 27 page decision, Judge Pitman that the plaintiffs, including Associated Builders and Contractors of Texas and the National Federation of Independent Businessmen, could not establish that the NLRB’s December 14, 2014 rule “Representation – Case Procedures; Final Rule,” (the “New ...

As reported in Epstein Becker Green’s May 2015 Immigration Alert, the National Labor Relations Board (the “Board” or “NLRB”) continues to focus on issues concerning the rights of undocumented workers whose rights under the National Labor Relations Act (the “Act”) are interfered with for engaging in union activity and other forms of protected, concerted activity covered by the Act.

In its March 27, 2015, Supplemental Decision in Mezenos Maven Bakery, Inc., 362 NLRB No. 41 (2015), the Board, in response to a remand from the United States Court of Appeals for the Second ...

May 14th marked the one-month anniversary of the effective date of the NLRB’s Amended Representation Election Rules (“amended rules”).  That day, the Regional Directors for NLRB Regions 2 (New York, NY), 22 (Newark, NJ), and 29 (Brooklyn, NY) discussed their offices’ experiences processing representation petitions filed since the amended rules took effect on April 14th.

With respect to the questions of how the amended rules are actually affecting representation petitions and elections, while one month may not be representative, the data to date does offer some ...

The National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”) unfair labor practice hearing  against McDonald’s, USA, LLC (“McDonald’s) and numerous franchisees opened in New York City on Monday March 30, 2015, before Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ”) Lauren Esposito. (“ALJ”), a former NLRB field attorney and union lawyer. Also this week, the Service Employees International Union (“SEIU”) announced that it was investing an additional Fifteen Million Dollars in the Fight For Fifteen campaign, which seeks to organize fast food workers nationwide and that a series of ...

Employers in the Technology Media and Telecommunications (“TMT”) industries have generally not thought that union organizing was an issue that affected their businesses and workforces.  Recent developments suggest that this is no longer the case.

These industries have earned reputations for innovative workplaces, generous benefits, and free food. At the same time, technology companies have outsourced many non-core functions such as campus security, maintenance, and transportation to third party suppliers.  Employees of these vendors  generally receive less ...

New Union Rules and Rulings: Proactive Strategies for Employers Facing Today’s Aggressive National Labor Relations Board and New Expedited Representation Elections

April 14, 2015 – Hilton Westchester, Rye Brook, New York

May 7, 2015 – The L.A. Hotel Downtown, Los Angeles, California

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has adopted dramatic new rules and processes for union representation elections scheduled to take effect on April 14, 2015. The NLRB has also changed many of its standards concerning workplace rules, handbooks and policies affecting ALL EMPLOYERS ...

On January 5, 2015, less than one month after the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) voted to adopt a Final Rule to amend its rules and procedures for representation elections, a lawsuit has been filed in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, asserting that the Board exceeded its authority under the National Labor Relations Act (Act) when it amended its rules for votes on union representation and that the new rule in unconstitutional and violates the First and Fifth Amendments of the US Constitution.

The suit was filed by the Chamber of Commerce of the United ...

Following the NLRB’s announcement on July 29th of its position that McDonald’s and its franchisees are joint employers, commentators across the spectrum have been opining about this actually means for employers, unions and workers.

This week the AFL-CIO weighed in with its opinions in a post on its blog AFL-CIO NOW.  After recounting the background of the developments, in section called “What’s the Big Picture?” the author points out how organized labor intends to take advantage of the Board’s anticipated broadening of the standards for finding joint employer ...

The NLRB’s General Counsel’s Office, in an Advice Memo dated October 25, 2013  (pdf) and released to the public on August 7, 2014, has taken the position that “an enterprise that grows, processes, and retails medical marijuana” is an employer subject to the National Labor Relations Act provided it meets the Board’s monetary jurisdictional standards and is an employer engaged in commerce and that “the Board should assert jurisdiction over this type of business enterprise.”   

Notably, the General Counsel’s office advocates the position that even though all of ...

The National Labor Relations Board has been busy since the Supreme Court’s June 26th Noel Canning decision trying to address the issues and uncertainty resulting from the Court’s holding that recess appointments of Board members on January 4, 2012, were invalid because the Senate was not actually in recess.  As we pointed out in our earlier post, this meant that numerous Board decisions from January 4, 2012 until August 5, 2013, because the Board lacked a quorum at the time that the cases were decided and many administrative actions, including appointments of Regional Directors ...

NLRB General Counsel Richard Griffin announced on Tuesday July 29^th   that he has authorized issuance of Unfair Labor Practice Complaints based on 43 of 181 charges pending against McDonald’s, USA, LLC and various of its franchisees, in which the Board will allege that the company and its franchisees are joint-employers. If the General Counsel prevails on his theory that McDonalds is a joint employer with its franchisees, the result would be not only a finding of shared responsibility for unfair labor practices, but could also mean that the franchisor would share in the ...

The New York Times reported today in its business section in article by Steven Greenhouse, who covers labor matters for the paper, about a convention taking place in Addison. The convention is underwritten by the Service Employees International Union or SEIU, which has been not very quietly backing the “Stand for Fifteen,” movement in its quest for wages of $15 per hour in the fast food field.  It is probably not a coincidence that Addison is just four miles from McDonald’s headquarters in Oak Brook, Il.

While most of last week’s focus in labor relations law was on the NLRB’s ...

By: Steven M. Swirsky, Adam C. Abrahms, and D. Martin Stanberry

In case you were hoping that the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Noel Canning would finally put to bed any questions regarding President Obama’s recess appointments to the NLRB, or that the Fifth Circuit’s rejection of the Board’s decision in  D.R. Horton might alter the NLRB’s position on the right of employers to require employees to abide by mandatory arbitration agreements , think again.

In Fuji Food Products a decision issued on July 15, 2014, NLRB Administrative Law Judge Jeffrey D. Wedekind held ...

By: Adam C. Abrahms, Kara M. Maciel, Steven M. Swirsky, and Mark M. Trapp

The U.S. Supreme Court today held that the US Senate was not in recess on January 4, 2012, when President Obama made three “recess” appointments to the National Labor Relations Board under the Constitution’s Recess Appointment Clause.  In simple terms that means that the recess appointments were not proper and s decisions in which the recess appointees participated were not valid.

What this now means is that hundreds of cases decided by the NLRB following the January 4, 2012 recess appointments to the ...

By Steven M. Swirsky and Peter M. Panken

NLRB General Counsel Richard Griffin has declared in an April 30, 2014 General Counsel Memorandum. that his office will continue and expand the increasingly aggressive pursuit of injunctions in Federal Court against employers in connection with union organizing and bargaining for initial collective bargaining agreements.

In GC Memorandum GC 14-30, the Board’s regional offices have been directed that they should aggressively consider requesting authorization from the General Counsel and the Board to pursue Section 10(j) injunctions ...

An NLRB Administrative Law Judge issued a Decision on April 29^th in which he found that when a waiter in a restaurant in New York City, acting alone, instituted a class action lawsuit claiming violation of state or federal wage and hour laws, he was  engaging in concerted activity on behalf of himself and co-workers, even if none of those co-workers are aware of the filing.  While the decision does not mention whether the waiter was represented by a union, it seems pretty clear that there was no union in this case.

Thus, the Judge concluded, when the restaurant terminated the waiter, it did so ...

By Steven M. Swirsky and Adam C. Abrahms

The Regional Director for the NLRB’s Chicago Region has found that football players at Northwestern University who receive scholarships are “employees” for purposes of the National Labor Relations Act.  Some of the football players blindsided the University, NCAA and college athletics by filing a petition to be represented by the College Athlete Players Association (CAPA), a putative union funded and supported by the United Steelworkers union. As only "employees" are covered by the National Labor Relations Act, finding them to be ...

By Steven M. Swirsky, Adam C. Abrahms, Kara M. Maciel, and Casey M. Cosentino

As previously predicted by the Management Memo on August 1, 2013 and October 30, 2013, the National Labor Relations Board (the “Board”) issued a second Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“NPRM”) to amend its existing rules and regulations governing union elections procedures. If they look familiar when you see them, there is a good reason for that: you have seen them before.

As readers of the Management Memo are well aware, the NPRM is the latest development in the long saga of organized labor’s attempts ...

by: Adam C. Abrahms, Kara M. Maciel, Adam C. Solander, and Steven M. Swirsky

On September 13, 2013, the Obama Administration rejected the union movement’s intense  lobbying efforts to seek a waiver, so that their members would be able to receive tax subsidies in the Affordable Care Act (“ACA”) Marketplaces for those of their members who will be offered “affordable coverage” from their employers.

Beginning January 1, 2015, the ACA requires that large employers offer affordable health coverage that provides minimum value to their “full-time employees” (those working ...

By Adam C. Abrahms, Steven M. Swirsky, and D. Martin Stanberry

On Tuesday, August 20th, in an opinion that follows in the wake of Noel Canning, United States District Judge Benjamin H. Settle dismissed an injunction petition filed by Ronald Hooks, a Regional Director  of the National Labor Relations Board, on the grounds that he was “without power” to issue the underlying unfair labor practice complaint.

The Regional Director had initially filed the petition with the District Court in June in an effort to obtain a temporary injunction that would, among other things, have ...

On July 30th the Senate confirmed career union lawyer Kent Hirozawa (D) and retired AFL-CIO Associate General Counsel Nancy Schiffer (D) as well as seasoned management labor lawyers Philip Miscimarra (R) and Harry Johnson (R) to serve on the National Labor Relations Board.    The Senate also confirmed current NLRB Chairman Mark Gaston Pearce (D).

The confirmations are of course the result of the Senate Republicans backing down in the face of the threat by Senate Democrats to change Senate rules so that they could force a vote, up or down, on  President Obama's  nominations for the Board and ...

By Steven M. Swirsky, Adam C. Abrahms, and D. Martin Stanberry

With an eye toward next term, the Supreme Court announced on Monday, June 24th, that it had granted the National Labor Relations Board's (“NLRB”) petition for certiorari in Noel Canning v. NLRB. This news all but ensures that America’s highest court will determine not only the fate of President Obama's recess appointments to the Board, but also the extent of a president's Constitutional power to appoint individuals to various federal agencies, departments and courts without the advice and consent of the Senate.

By Adam C. Abrahms and Steven M. Swirsky

In another major defeat for President Obama’s appointees to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB or Board), the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit found that the Board lacked the authority to issue a 2011 rule which would have required all employers covered by the National Labor Relations Act (the “Act”), including those whose employees are not unionized,  to post a workplace notice to employees. The putative Notice, called a “Notification of Employee Rights Under the National Labor Relations Act,” is intended to ostensibly ...

by: Steven M. Swirsky and D. Martin Stanberry

An NLRB Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ”) has found that two computer usage policies of University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (“UPMC”) violated the National Labor Relations Act (“Act”) because they had an unreasonable tendency to chill employee activities, including union organizing and employee discussions about terms and conditions of employment, protected by Section 7 of the Act.

The policies at issue prohibited employees from using the employer’s email and other electronic messaging systems “in a way that ...

by: James S. Frank, Steven M. Swirsky, and D. Martin Stanberry

The Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on Wednesday February 27^th, in NLRB v. Special Touch Home Care Servs. Inc., 11-3147 (2d.Cir., Feb. 27, 2013) (PDF) that the NLRB erred when finding that 48 home health aides were protected by the National Labor Relations Act (“Act”) when they participated in a strike after affirmatively telling their employer that they would be present for their shifts at their respective patients’ homes during the week of the strike.

While the NLRB had held that the workers actions were ...

I co-authored an Act Now Advisory on the decision issued by NLRB Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) Joel Biblowitz on January 8, 2013, finding that Quicken Loans’ agreements concerning proprietary and confidential information and non-disparagement unlawfully interfered with these unrepresented employees’ Section 7 rights to engage in concerted and protected activity.  The ALJ decision adopts the expansive views of Acting General Counsel Lafe Solomon and further expands the Board’s involvement in non-union workplaces.

Click here to read the full advisory on ...

On Friday, November 16, I participated in a free 75-minute webinar discussion with Lafe E. Solomon, Acting General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board.  The webinar was moderated by Terence H. McGuire of the Practical Law Company.  We discussed:

• Factors that the NLRB considers when deciding whether to prosecute unfair labor practices based on these employment practices.
• Legal considerations surrounding these employment practices besides compliance with the National Labor Relations Act.
• The NLRB’s stance on what is and is not a lawful at will disclaimer.
• Social Media ...