Delaware Employment Law Blog

If enacted next year, the Employee Free Choice Act (“EFCA”) would amend the National Labor Relations Act by doing away with secret ballot elections and replacing them with a card-check procedure that would require unions only to obtain signed authorization cards by a majority of employees in order to organize.

Employers’ current concern that the law will be enacted is causing some to overreact by, among other things, implementing grievance and arbitration procedures that mimic those in union contracts. But doing so at this stage makes little sense, whether or not the EFCA is passed. If it is not, employers would find themselves with unwieldy and expensive procedures that might not be suitable for their workplaces. And they would be handing the unions an argument in favor of organizing – pointing to adoption of these procedures as something almost all union contracts already have, and being able to puff about how much more the potential union members can expect if they agree to unionize. Moreover, by adopting these procedures now, employers deprive themselves of a major bargaining chip in the event they do reach the table for collective bargaining negotiations. All in all, adopting a wait and see approach makes a great deal of sense in this situation.

Employers should be aware of several employment and labor law initiatives in the state and federal legislatures.  Congress currently is considering the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), and the RESPECT Act, for starters. And the Construction Industry Independent Contractor Act, which was quietly passed by the Delaware and Pennsylvania Houses poses serious risks to employers in the construction trade.

Employee Free Choice Act

The EFCA could be a silent killer.  It has managed to keep a very low profile during its months-long visit to Capital Hill.  In short, it would eliminate the secret-ballot vote and would require employers to recognize a labor union without an election.  The long-unchanged law currently requires employers to choose between recognizing the union and a secret-ballot election if more than 50% of employees in a bargaining unit sign a union authorization card. 

If passed, the EFCA would change this procedure entirely.  Employers would have to recognize the labor union immediately if more than half of the workforce signs union cards.  And, to make it worse, there's not much an employer can do about it.  Union campaigns can be fully underway before the employer even learns about it.  And interference in card-gathering activities would subject the employer to civil penalties.

RESPECT Act

The unfortunately named RESPECT Act poses another labor-related threat to employers in the construction industry.  The "Re-Empowerment of Skilled and Professional Employees and Construction Tradeworkers Act" would amend the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) by redefining the definition of "supervisor."  If passed, the RESPECT Act would eliminate the current requirement to obtain supervisor-classification that the employee must posses the authority to assign work to others and to responsibly direct employees.  Instead, the definition of supervisor would be much more difficult to satisfy.  The proposed definition would require the employee to exercise authority over employees for a majority of his or her working time.

There is a giant leap from possessing authority and exercising that authority for a majority of working time. 

We've posted about the state-level initiatives that would criminalize misclassification of employees as independent contractors that have passed the House both in Delaware and in Pennsylvania.  It may be that the definition of "independent contractor" becomes key in avoiding a criminal conviction.  The EEOC provides a non-exclusive list of 17 factors, as well as examples of the factors in use, for use in making that determination.

Helpful Resources

Kris Dunn at The HR Capitalist has a persuasive post about the Employee Free Choice Act and the potential catastrophe it could cause if passed.

The American Nurses Association, which is very pro-RESPECT Act, has a current list of the legislators who support the bill--check to see if your state's legislator is one of the them.  If he or she is on the list, put pen to paper and tell your elected officials what you and the entire industry stand to lose if the RESPECT Act is passed.

E-mail has become the modern-day medium for union solicitation. Employers who restrict employees' use of company e-mail must do so in a way that does not violate Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).  The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) was asked to determine the limits of these restrictions in a case decided in December 2007, The Guard Publishing Company, d/b/a The Register-Guard, 351 NLRB No. 70 (Dec. 16, 2007) (Register-Guard). But the decision may have raised more questions than it answered.

The NLRB's Decision

In Register-Guard, the Board was asked to rule on the circumstances under which an employer may discipline an employee for personal use of the business' e-mail account. Restrictions, the union argued, constituted an unfair labor practice based on its discriminatory effect on union solicitation.

The Board determined that an employer who restricted the use of its e-mail system to work-related business did not violate section 8(a)(1) of the NLRA when it applied this rule to Section 7 activity. The Board majority held that an employers email system is company property that employees have no statutory right to use. Although the decision offered some insight into the limits of e-mail usage policies, it was not the definitive resolution many had hoped for.

The Application of Register-Guard to the Unionized Workplace

Then, on May 15, 2008, NLRB General Counsel Ronald Meisburg issued a memorandum describing the Boards application of the holding in Register-Guard. Since the Register-Guard decision, Regional Officers have submitted discrimination cases involving company property to the Division of Advice. Labor and employment law blog, the Washington Labor & Employment Wire reports on the determinations reached by the Division of Advice:

1. An employer did not violate the Act by enforcing a rule that barred union officials from sending e-mails to company managers outside of the facility. The union used the company's e-mail system to send broadly distributed messages to company managers outside the facility. The Division determined that the company' rule was lawful because it concerned how the union was permitted to use the employer's e-mail system and did not otherwise prohibit the union from engaging in protected communications.
2. An employer's rule that prohibits solicitation for any purpose during work hours was unlawful when applied to union activity.  The employer inconsistently enforced this policy by permitting non-union-related solicitation activity including institutional and individual commercial solicitations, school fundraising solicitations, and personal solicitations. The Division reasoned that an employer may not discriminatorily enforce a facially valid no-e-mail-solicitation rule.
3. A rule that was re-promulgated after union organizing activities began at the employer's site was a violation of the Act. After an employee sent emails about a union meeting, the employee was disciplined for misusing the employer's email system. Prior to sending the email, the employee checked with the employer's IT director to determine what was considered abuse of the employer's computer system. The IT director did not inform the employee that personal email or email solicitation was against employer policy.     The case initially settled after an investigation revealed that the employee was disciplined because of union activity. Subsequently, the employer again disciplined the same employee for sending another email with union-related content. The Division concluded that the employer re-promulgated its email rule for anti-union reasons, and discriminatorily enforced the rule against union activity.
4. An employer violated the Act when it discriminatorily enforced its electronic communications policy against an employee. The employer terminated the employment of an employee after the employer learned that the employee was the author of an email sent to the employer's Board of Directors that listed concerns that employees had about working conditions. The employer alleged that the employee was terminated for inappropriately using the employer's computers in violation of its policy.           The Division found that the employer unlawfully discharged the employee for engaging in protected activities. The Division noted that the employer's email policy allowed reasonable personal use of the employer's computer and the employer permitted employees' use of the Internet, email, and other company equipment for personal purposes. Thus, the Division concluded that the employer disparately enforced its email policy.
5. An employer violated the Act when it discriminatorily prohibited use of its employee bulletin board. A union organization event was held at one of the employer's stores during which union material was placed on a bulletin board within the store designated for employees. The bulletin board was used for personal and general non-work related matters. The union material was taken down and the employer later turned the bulletin board into a management-only posting site. The Division concluded that the facts established an anti-union motive because the timing of the employer's conduct and the actions themselves were directly in response to the union activity.

These decisions reinforce the presumptive rule: an employer may not use facially neutral rules to effectuate anti-union animus nor may an employer discriminatorily enforce rules to prohibit protected collective activity.

What Other Employment-Law Blogs Are Saying

Since the General Counsel's memo was released, several employment-law bloggers have given additional discussion to the limits of workplace policies on personal e-mail usage. Some of the most informative posts include The Manpower Employment Law Blog's post, "Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About the New Union Email Rules," which was subsequently picked up by The Laconic Law Blog. The Ohio Employers' Law Blog tells us "How to Apply the New E-Mail Solicitation Rules."   And, earlier in the month, the Workplace Profs Blog posted about the General Counsel's Memo.

New Castle County’s blue-collar union ratified a three year contract, which provides for no cost-of-living increases in the next two years. The News Journal’s story on the settlement is located here. T

he agreement was reached after over a year of negotiations and reflects the tough economic times faced by New Castle County and other governments in Delaware. See our earlier post.

Bill Bowser and I will be discussing the state of public sector negotiations on April 16 at our Department’s Annual Seminar.

To register, contact Marie Willey at 571-4751. Cost is $95. Lunch is provided.

The Delaware Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) is in its twenty-fifth year of operation. It administers public labor relations in much the same way as the NLRB oversees the private sector. On January 1st, Deborah Murray-Sheppard became the PERB’s new Executive Director. I recently had the opportunity to speak with her about PERB and the recent changes expanding PERB’s responsibilities.

Q: What’s new at the Public Employment Relations Board?

A: It certainly has been a time of change for PERB. First, is the retirement on January 1 of my friend and mentor, Charlie Long, as Executive Director. He and I have worked as a team for 24 years. Fortunately, he has been working a couple of days a week to ease us through this transition.

In addition to a change at the top, PERB’s responsibility has continued to expand. For example, interest arbitration has been expanded to include virtually all public employers. Also, all State employees now have the right to bargain over wages for the first time.

Q: Can you give us a general breakdown of PERB’s workload?

A: PERB handled about 58 cases from April of last year to the present. Eight of those cases involved traditional unfair labor charges. About 29 cases involved the collective bargaining process, including three requests for binding interest arbitration and, 21 cases involved issues of representation.

Q: Binding arbitration has been one of the most important changes in public labor relations in many years. How’s it been working?

A: Well, the answer to that probably depends on who you’re asking. I can tell you that only a handful of requests actually have gone all the way to a hearing before an arbitrator. Most requests have been resolved through our pre-arbitration facilitation process. Of the three decisions issued by PERB, all three have been in favor of the employer.

Q: What cases are scheduled interest arbitration now?

A: We have only one right now. Certain employees at the Port of Wilmington are scheduled for an interest arbitration hearing in late May. In addition, the state troopers have completed mediation and are participating in our pre-arbitration facilitation process. Recently, two cases were settled by the parties before a hearing. The City of Wilmington was able to reach an agreement with its rank and file police officers and New Castle County was able to reach a tentative agreement with its blue collar workers.

Q: All State employees recently obtained the right to bargain over wages. How has that process been going?

A: We are still working our way through that process. Under the new law, PERB was required to place each state job into one of 12 statewide units. Unrepresented employees are now in a position of requesting that they be represented by a union for purpose of collective bargaining. We now have five such petitions pending. The petitions are in various stages of the process.

Q: What do you see on the horizon for PERB?

A: I think we’ll continue to be very busy. Over 50% of the collective bargaining agreements under our jurisdiction have expired or are about to expire. The volume of collective bargaining going on and the tight economic climate suggests that our services will continue to be in demand.

The PERB's official website can be accessed here.

The parents in the group might need to sit down for this story. . .

In a bizarre and frightening incident, a middle school girls’ softball coach at the Seaford School District apparently injected one of the girls on his team with an adrenaline-filled Epi Pen--not to save her life by combating an allergic reaction—but apparently in retaliation for lackadaisical play on the field.

The girl’s family is now suing the school district for failing to properly and thoroughly verify the coach’s background.

Hiring is one of the most important decisions any employer can make. A failure to carefully screen employees can not only result in adding underperformers to your workforce, it can result in exposure to theft, violence, and legal liability.

This recent incident in Seaford underscores the importance of a thorough and productive background check. But how do you get real, useful information in a world where many employers are advised to divulge only “name, rank, and serial number” of their former employees?

Tips for Conducting An Effective Background Check:

1. Get a release - the best way is to reduce the fear of a lawsuit. Get a release of liability from the applicant whose references you are checking, and provide it to the employer. Common sense dictates that the chance of a lawsuit will be substantially reduced when the potential plaintiff has already authorized the release and discussion of employment-related information.

2. Inform of Delaware’s reference check law - you should also tell your contacts about Delaware's reference check law, which gives former, current, and prospective employers immunity from a lawsuit for providing references in "good faith." Better yet, give them a copy of the law to review and provide to their legal counsel.

3. Say the password - most experienced HR professionals you contact will be just as frustrated as you are about the inability to get information about prospective employees. As a result, you might want to give them the opportunity to help you out and still sleep at night. Try asking whether the applicant is "eligible for rehire." A negative answer might be just what you need to steer clear of an individual.

4. Find a secret source - another way to get information is to go directly to the applicant's supervisor. That person will have the most information and will be more likely to provide it than the HR department. Of course, you want to prevent such a maneuver against your company, so make sure you constantly remind your own supervisors about your policies on background checks and that all inquiries should go through HR.

5. Go public - your high-school principal was right when he warned you that your youthful transgressions would be "on your permanent record." Criminal arrest and conviction records are a matter of public record. They are not only public but also easy to get, at least for offenses committed in Delaware. A visit to the prothonotary (clerk) in the state courthouse located in Wilmington, Dover, or Georgetown can get you free access to an applicant's arrest and conviction record free of charge.

6. Visit cyberspace - another source of information is the Internet. Search engines like Google can scour the Internet for websites, newspaper articles, and postings by applicants. Similar checks on social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook can provide useful information as well. Use of such searches is becoming common. A 2006 survey by CareerBuilder.com indicated that 26 percent of hiring managers have used the Internet to collect information on applicants. Half of those managers said they had accessed personal information on social networking sites.