In an Advice Memorandum released on May 25, 2022, NLRB General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo laid out a blueprint for changes she’d like made to Board precedent concerning union representatives’ access to employer property.  At issue is a pair of 2019 rulings by the NLRB in UPMC, 368 NLRB No. 2 (2019) and Kroger Ltd. P’ship, 368 NLRB No. 64 (2019), which together provided employers with greater latitude to bar union representatives from accessing public spaces within the employer’s facilities and grounds.

While an Advice Memorandum does not constitute a change in the law, it certainly gives a clear indication of how the current General Counsel will advise the Regions in deciding whether and how to prosecute future cases.  This most recent GC memo makes good on initiatives she articulated last year (previously discussed here).  The issue of union access to employer facilities was specifically foreshadowed as a topic for reassessment in the General Counsel’s “Mandatory Submissions to Advice GC Memorandum 21-04,” released on August 12, 2021.

Background – LT Transportation, Case 05-CA-281089

This Advice Memorandum is the result of an issue raised in a recent case before the Board, LAZ Parking Mid Atlantic, LLC, d/b/a LT Transporation, Case 05-CA-281089.

There, the conduct at issue was that the company wrote a letter to the union that was trying to organize the company’s drivers, prohibiting the union’s representatives from going to stops along the shuttle bus routes to talk to the drivers.  The union argued that barring non-employee union agents from boarding the employer’s publicly-used shuttles violated Sections 8(a)(1) and (3) of the NLRA.

The union ultimately withdrew the charges after winning the election to represent the company’s shuttle bus drivers.  However, the closing of the case allowed GC Abruzzo to issue the Advice Memorandum and opine on the legality of the prohibition of the union’s access to public facilities.

The History of Non-Employee Union Access Cases Pre-2019

In 1956, the Supreme Court issued NLRB v. Babcock & Wilcox Co., 351 U.S. 105 (1956), which held that employers could exclude non-employee union representatives from an employer’s property unless one of two conditions are present:

  • Employees are otherwise inaccessible to the union; or
  • The employer has discriminated against the union by prohibiting it from using the employer’s facilities, but provides access to non-union groups.

After Babcock, the Board was faced with a number of fact-specific scenarios confronting the discrimination questions, including situations involving “public spaces” – i.e., spaces either contained within, or adjacent to yet part of, an employer’s private property, but which were open to the public.  The Board addressed whether an employer, by virtue of allowing the public to utilize a particular portion of its otherwise private property effectively discriminates when it excludes the union access to said property for purposes of engaging in otherwise protected, concerted activity.

Since Babcock, the Board held on numerous occasions that unions could access such public spaces, as long as organizers used them consistently with the public property’s intended use and were not disruptive to the employer.  Cases over the years involved public sidewalks adjacent to a store, public restaurants located in a portion of the employer’s department store, public cafeterias, and casinos’ bars and restaurants.

The Board’s 2019 Decisions in UPMC and Kroger

In UPMC, 368 NLRB No. 2 (2019), the Board held that the “public spaces” exception referenced above was inconsistent with Babcock.  In overruling the prior cases that outlined a “public spaces” exception, the Board announced that employers could eject union organizers or representatives from such “public spaces,” unless one of the two exceptions from Babcock were demonstrated:  a showing of inaccessibility or discrimination based on the use by non-union groups.

The Board also took the opportunity to further define discrimination under the Babcock standard. The Board stated that discrimination in union access cases exists where “by rule or practice a property owner permits similar activity in similar relevant circumstances.”  The focus, according to the Board, should be on the conduct of the non-employee organizers, rather than their identities.

In Kroger Ltd. P’ship, 368 NLRB No. 64 (2019), the Board found discrimination against non-employee organizers only where it can be found that other non-employees engage in “similar activity in similar relevant circumstances.”  According to the Board, this standard encompasses both the literal activity engaged in, but also the purpose of the activity, which could result in an employer lawfully banning union organizers from distributing union literation, while allowing non-employee access for other charitable, civic and commercial activities.

General Counsel Abruzzo’s May 25th Advice Memo

General Counsel Abruzzo’s Advice Memorandum makes three principal points:

  • The Employer’s conduct in LT Transportation violated the NLRA, even based on the current standard. According to GC Abruzzo, the Employer’s prohibition was unlawful because it focused not on the union organizers’ conduct, but on their identity, as she believed the organizers did not engage in any activity – e., discussing working conditions with the drivers – in which the general public did not engage.
  • UPMC was incorrectly decided and should be overruled. According to GC Abruzzo, UPMC is inconsistent with Supreme Court precedent from Babcock and its progeny, which the Board was not privileged to alter.  The Board, in UPMC, incorrectly likened the union organizers’ activities to sales people surreptitiously entering the employer’s property, which according to GC Abruzzo, “disregards Section 1 and Section 7 of the Act.”
  • Kroger should also be overruled. The “similar in nature” standard illustrated by the Board in Kroger, according to GC Abruzzo, permits “[s]ingling out union activity for negative treatment,” and, therefore, is inconsistent with the NLRA.

Takeaways

Although the precedent in UPMC and Kroger remain good law for the moment, this Advice Memorandum clearly signals the General Counsel’s intention to encourage Regions to issue a complaint in similar subsequent cases, with the goal of getting the Board to ultimately overrule those decisions.

As a result, given the current composition of the Board for the foreseeable future, it seems all but inevitable that UPMC and Kroger will be overturned, and the “public spaces” exception under Babcock that existed prior to 2019 will go back into effect.  If that occurs, then unions will (once again) be permitted to access public spaces on or adjacent to employer’s private property, as long as the union representatives use the spaces consistently with the public property’s intended use and were not disruptive to the employer.

 

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Photo of Steven Porzio Steven Porzio

Steven J. Porzio is a partner in the Labor & Employment Law Department and a member of the Labor-Management Relations Group. Steve assists both unionized and union-free clients with a full range of labor and employee relations matters. He represents employers in contract…

Steven J. Porzio is a partner in the Labor & Employment Law Department and a member of the Labor-Management Relations Group. Steve assists both unionized and union-free clients with a full range of labor and employee relations matters. He represents employers in contract negotiations, arbitrations, and representation and unfair labor practice cases before the National Labor Relations Board.

Steve has experience conducting vulnerability assessments and providing management training in union and litigation avoidance, leave management, wage and hour, and hiring and firing practices. He provides strategic and legal advice in certification and decertification elections, union organizing drives, corporate campaigns, picketing and union contract campaigns. Steve has represented employers in a number of different industries, including higher education, health care, construction and manufacturing in successful efforts against unions in election and corporate campaigns.

In addition to his traditional labor law work, Steve assists companies with handbook and personnel policy drafting and review, daily management of employee disciplines and terminations, and general advice and counsel on compliance with federal and state employment laws.

Steve’s litigation experience includes work on matters before state and federal courts, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities, the New York State Division of Human Rights and various other administrative agencies. He has litigated matters involving age, race, national origin, gender and disability discrimination, wage and hour, whistleblower and wrongful termination claims.

While attending the Syracuse University College of Law, Steve served as the editor-in-chief of the Syracuse Science and Technology Law Reporter. He also received the Robert F. Koretz scholarship, awarded in recognition of excellence in the study of labor law.

Photo of Joshua Fox Joshua Fox

Joshua S. Fox is a senior counsel in the Labor & Employment Law Department and a member of the Sports, Labor-Management Relations, Class and Collective Actions and Wage and Hour Groups.

As a member of the Sports Law Group, Josh has represented several…

Joshua S. Fox is a senior counsel in the Labor & Employment Law Department and a member of the Sports, Labor-Management Relations, Class and Collective Actions and Wage and Hour Groups.

As a member of the Sports Law Group, Josh has represented several Major League Baseball Clubs in all aspects of the salary arbitration process, including the Miami Marlins, Boston Red Sox, Los Angeles Dodgers, Kansas City Royals, San Francisco Giants, Tampa Bay Rays and Toronto Blue Jays. In particular, Josh successfully represented the Miami Marlins in their case against All-Star Catcher J.T. Realmuto, which was a significant club victory in salary arbitration. Josh also represents Major League Baseball and its clubs in ongoing litigation brought by current and former minor league players who allege minimum wage and overtime violations. Josh participated on the team that successfully defended Major League Baseball in a wage-and-hour lawsuit brought by a former volunteer for the 2013 All-Star FanFest, who alleged minimum wage violations under federal and state law. The lawsuit was dismissed by the federal district court, and was affirmed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

Josh also has extensive experience representing professional sports leagues and teams in grievance arbitration proceedings, including playing a vital role in all aspects of the grievance challenging the suspension for use of performance-enhancing drugs of then-New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez. Josh also has counseled NHL Clubs and served on the trial teams for grievances alleging violations of the collective bargaining agreement, including cases involving use of performance-enhancing substances, domestic violence issues, and supplementary discipline for on-ice conduct. He has played a key role in representing professional sports leagues in all aspects of their collective bargaining negotiations with players and officials, including the Major League Baseball, National Hockey League, the National Football League, Major League Soccer, the Professional Referee Organization, and the National Basketball Association,.

In addition, Josh has extensive experience representing clients in the performing arts industry, including the New York City Ballet, New York City Opera, Big Apple Circus, among many others, in collective bargaining negotiations with performers and musicians, the administration of their collective bargaining agreements, and in grievance arbitrations.

Josh also represents a diverse range of clients, including real estate developers and contractors, pipe line contractors, hospitals, hotels, manufacturers and public employers, in collective bargaining, counseling on general employment matters and proceedings before the National Labor Relations Board, New York State Public Employment Relations Board and arbitrators.

Josh has also recently served as an adjunct professor at Cornell University’s School of Industrial Labor Relations for the past two years, teaching a course regarding Major League Baseball salary arbitration.

Prior to joining Proskauer, Josh worked for a year and a half at the National Hockey League, where he was involved in all labor and employment matters, including preparations for collective bargaining, grievance arbitration, contract drafting and reviewing and employment counseling. Josh also interned in the labor relations department of Major League Baseball and at Region 2 of the National Labor Relations Board. He was a member of the Brooklyn Law Review and the Appellate Moot Court Honor Society and served as president of the Brooklyn Entertainment and Sports Law Society.