LaborPains.org

Labor unions are allowed to “pressure” businesses with which they have a direct dispute. But what about companies that are completely neutral? Keith Eastland, a labor lawyer in Grand Rapids, wrote an op-ed explaining an unfortunate decision by the National Labor Relations Board.

Employers can expect the new board to grant much broader protections to union-related activity. An Aug. 27 board decision on “bannering” highlights this point. Bannering refers to the display of large signs, often containing misleading claims, at job sites belonging to neutral parties. It is a union tactic often designed to threaten and coerce neutral businesses to avoid dealing with non-union contractors or suppliers.

Although the law expressly prohibits unions from engaging in coercive or threatening actions toward neutral businesses, the new board has ruled that bannering is protected. Under this new rule, unions can now target your business or job sites with large banners — or use giant inflatable rats signifying the presence of “scabs” — even when you have no labor dispute with that union.

The case before the NLRB began in Arizona where representatives of the Carpenters Local 1506 (consisting of non-union temp workers  being paid to play the part of “picketer”) held 16-foot-long signs outside two medical centers and a restaurant. The signs read “Shame on…(the name of the establishment)” with the words “Labor Dispute” nearby. The catch? The establishments had no conflict with the union. The dispute was with construction companies doing work for the establishments’ owners.

This should have been a no-brainer for the NLRB. The National Labor Relations Act forbids conduct found to “threaten, coerce, or restrain” secondary businesses not involved in the primary dispute. But chalk one up to the labor-stacked NLRB, i.e. Craig Becker and Co.: They found a way to rule in the union’s favor.

To what extreme’s will unions take this new rule?

Recently the [United Brotherhood of Carpenters in Salt Lake City] has taken its bannering a step further by targeting companies that don’t do business with the Contractors. The banners are the same. But the handbills reveal that the company named is a potential tenant in a building where one of the Contractors is slated to perform work. According to the Union, the company being bannered is guilty of “thinking about profiting from unfair labor practices.” By this measure, most of the population might be subject to bannering.

A “potential tenant” where a company “is slated to perform work”? How far will bannering go? Could a union pressure the company that employs the aunt of the owner of a plumbing company that services an office building that houses a paper company that sells supplies to another company with which the union has a dispute? Or perhaps just thinking about selling supplies is enough to put a company in the unions crosshairs. Thanks to Craig Becker’s NLRB, it’s certainly possible.

This video drives home the point. Despite being about NFCW, not the Carpenters, it’s the same practice of creating a deceptive union picket line.

Andy Stern may no longer be the head of the Service Employees International Union, a post he left in April, but that doesn’t mean he’s out of the news.  According to the AP, he’s being dragged into an FBI investigation.  Just read:

“The FBI and the U.S. Labor Department are investigating prominent labor leader Andy Stern in their probe of corruption at the Service Employees International Union, according to two people who have been interviewed by federal agents. The two organized labor officials met with federal agents this summer to answer questions about a six-figure book contract that Stern landed in 2006 and his role in approving money to pay the salary of an SEIU leader in California who allegedly performed no work. [...]

One person who spoke to federal agents twice, in May and June, said they asked about a 2006 contract in which Stern received a $175,000 advance from Simon & Schuster to write the book “A Country That Works.” The SEIU and its locals bought thousands of copies of the book after it was published. The union also paid thousands to fact-check and promote the book, but Stern pocketed the advance.

As the article notes, Andy Stern left the SEIU because he “wanted to focus more on his personal life.” In Washington, that could mean any number of things, but there is one thing it rarely means: the individual wants to focus more on their personal life.

Craig Becker has so far refused to recuse himself. Well, perhaps that not the best way to put it. He’s more thrown up his hands and explained that what we thought he would recuse himself from (i.e. things related to the SEIU) and what he meant when he promised to recuse himself are two very different things entirely. Turns out, our fear that his appointment would signal the implementation of card check by means other that legislation were not unfounded. According to the Wall Street Journal:

And as many Senators feared when he was nominated, Mr. Becker is using his position on the National Labor Relations Board to bypass the will of Congress.[...] As a top lawyer for the Service Employees International Union, Mr. Becker had suggested that the NLRB has the legal authority to impose card check—which eliminates secret ballots in union elections—without the approval of Congress. And lo, at the end of August the NLRB dropped the bombshell, when, in a 3-2 decision, it decided to revisit its important 2007 Dana Corp. ruling. [...]

This Dana reversal also raises more questions about Mr. Becker’s ethical standards. The labor lawyer has already refused to recuse himself from cases involving the SEIU, his former employer. Now it turns out he had filed a brief for the AFL-CIO in the original Dana case, arguing that there is no essential difference between card check and secret ballots and calling Dana-style protections “bad labor-relations policy.” Mr. Becker is clearly biased against Dana and by any reasonable standard should not be able to rule on it.

There have been several times when I’ve discussed the alternate means of implementing some of the key tenets of the Employee Free Choice Act, like HERE and HERE. It’s just nice to have the President blatantly confirm this agenda in his speech to the AFL-CIO.  Basic story? EFCA will be a challenge in the lame duck session, but no worries, we’ve got other ways of making it happen. From the Wall Street Journal:

Mr. Obama reiterated that the administration will put its weight behind it. “We are going to keep on fighting to pass the Employee Free Choice Act,” he told the 54 executive council members and others in the room. “We also know what and who is standing in the way of progress,” he said, adding that it will be “tough” to get the bill through the Senate and will take time to reverse the impact of “at least eight years in which there was a profound animosity toward the notion of unions.”

Mr. Obama also reminded the labor officials of the ways in which the administration has already supported unions, in part by wielding executive powers for actions that don’t require legislation.

“There’s a reason why we nominated people to the National Mediation Board that would ensure that folks in the rail and air” industries can organize, said Mr. Obama, referring to the board’s overhaul in May of a decades-old rule that had made it harder for airline and railway workers to unionize. He also cited the Democrats he nominated to the National Labor Relations Board to “restore some balance” to the group, which supervises union elections and referees disputes between private-sector employers and employees.

As cities across California and moreover, the entire state face financial obligations they can’t meet, the city of LA was on the cusp of reducing costs when the SEIU stepped in to bully another union.

Heaven forbid that the city of LA should be able to reign in employment costs and that another union be able to accept a deal the SEIU isn’t happy with.

According the the LA Times:

“Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and his top budget advisers thought they negotiated a labor contract last week that would begin to address the steadily rising cost of employee healthcare benefits. But that deal, reached with the 4,800-member Engineers and Architects Assn., has come under attack from members of another civilian employee union, which contends that the agreement contains “unprecedented and dangerous” concessions and should be rejected.

With the Engineers and Architects voting on the tentative agreement this week, organizers with Service Employees International Union Local 721 have begun warning that the proposed pact is part of a larger effort to “divide and conquer” the city’s civilian employee groups.”

The head of the beleaguered union says that behind the SEIU’s interest in the deal is their ongoing attempts to raid his union. So much for the “new directions” under Mary Kay Henry:

“Any move by one union to interfere with the negotiations of another union will ultimately backfire,” Szabo said, “because the city is likely to impose these healthcare provisions and more on those who opt out of the deal.” Michael Davies, interim executive director of the Engineers and Architects, said the Service Employees International Union is opposing the deal as part of its push to raid his union’s membership. Last fall, nearly 2,000 workers from his organization moved to the SEIU.

The SEIU and UNITE-HERE have settled up. Made peace. Cut ties.

According to the press release from the SEIU:

“The Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Workers United and UNITE HERE today announced a settlement agreement on behalf of the unions’ members and elected leadership that will bring to a close the protracted dispute between the unions. [...]

The agreement provides clarity and resolution to a divisive issue in labor, and at the same time, enables each union the opportunity to increase its focus and resources on addressing the larger problems faced by members and workers who have no union.”

The equally generous statement (with a side of smarmy) John Wilhelm:

I am pleased to report we have reached a binding agreement with SEIU that brings an end to nearly two years of hostilities. I credit new SEIU President Mary Kay Henry for personally devoting her energy to making this agreement.  For the sake of workers and the labor movement, I hope that this is the first step in making SEIU the great Union it can be under her leadership. [...]

And it restores to UNITE HERE the bulk of the financial assets that have been tied up in federal court, including the Manhattan real estate. UNITE HERE and SEIU agreed to seek approval from federal regulators to transfer ownership of the Amalgamated Bank to SEIU-affiliated Workers United.

The Amalgamated Bank, which UNITE brought to the table so willingly six years ago when merging with HERE was probably the grand prize in this labor war, and the SEIU won. Some would say that acquiring it was the goal along. Just ask Bruce Raynor, who according to Mary Kay Henry was integrally involved in the negotiations.

Almost one month ago to the day, it was announced that Andy Stern had joined the staff of Siga Technologies Inc. He wasn’t done yet. It was announced today that Mr. Stern will be gracing the good people of Georgetown with his…research.  According to the school:

The past president of one of the largest unions in North America will join the Georgetown Public Policy Institute (GPPI) as a senior research fellow beginning Aug. 1.  GPPI announced the appointment of former Service Employees International Union (SEIU) President Andy Stern to the position, for which he will conduct and coordinate research efforts on a number of social policy issues, including wage reform, labor policy, and retirement security.

And the answer to your burning question? No, Andy Stern will ever turn in his purple for the blue and grey.

Everybody does it. When you work for the government and your personal interests or background (or even future employment opportunities) conflict with your ability to do your job, you have to recuse yourself. End of story.

It’s commonly practiced; we could even say it’s ethical. Well, leave it to NLRB board member and union favorite Craig Becker to break with “tradition” and weigh in on cases involving the SEIU. See, it’s perfectly legal to weigh in on the goings-on of a particular local affiliated with the union that you worked for at a national level. And ne’er the two shall meet.

Back in February, here’s what was said during the hearing with the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on February 2, 2010, according to Bloomberg:

“Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona said he hoped Becker would recuse himself if confirmed from any case involving the SEIU, a labor union that spent $80 million to help elect Obama. Becker said he would recuse himself from such cases for two years if confirmed.”

You are more than welcome to listen to the entire hearing HERE to find the exact moment and the exact quote, but I’d say the promise is pretty clear.

Here’s the rub. Since February, Becker has apparantly changed his mind:

Craig Becker, former general counsel for the SEIU, was a controversial appointee to start with, owing to his radical and anti-democratic views on union power. But surely, Badertscher’s lawyers thought, he’d recuse himself from a case involving the SEIU. Becker refused to do so. In fact, he was part of a three-member panel that reviewed the SEIU/Pomona Valley case, and he has made it clear that he intends to continue involving himself in cases involving his former employer.

“There are 13 or 14 cases in which we’ve sought recusal for Craig Becker,” says Patrick Semmens, legal information director for the National Right to Work Foundation (NRWF), which represented Badertscher.