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Labor rallies to hold ground

About 30 people gather Monday to bring pressure on the National Labor Relations Board as it defines who qualifies as a supervisor.

By WILLIAM R. LEVESQUE
Published July 10, 2006

TAMPA — A registered nurse tells a less-experienced nurse’s aide to do something at a local hospital on a more or less regular basis.

When does that registered nurse cross the hazy boundary between being a rank-and-file employee, eligible for overtime and union status, and a supervisor eligible for little beyond the responsibility of the job?

Up to 30 people protested in Tampa on Monday, along with workers in 17 other U.S. cities, to put pressure on the National Labor Relations Board to decide that seemingly straightforward question as narrowly as possible to protect all workers, from nurses to construction laborers. The board is considering the issue in several cases, collectively known as the Kentucky River cases.

In particular, the mostly union crowd of workers lashed out at the NLRB for refusing to grant oral arguments in those cases, a decision viewed by them as an indication that the NLRB’s decision will slam workers by broadly defining who a supervisor is.

The crowd appeared convinced that the NLRB was simply the pro-business arm of the Bush Administration. The cases are being decided by the board in Washington, not locally.

Workers carried signs that said, “Don’t Roll Back Workers’ Rights” or stickers on shirts that said, “I Won’t Give Up My Voice at Work.”

“We’re here to make our voice heard,” said R. Floyd Suggs, president of the West Central Florida Federation of Labor, which helped organize the Tampa rally outside the E Kennedy Boulevard offices of the local NLRB.

“The administration is based on corporate greed. They’ll have employees working 50 or 60 hours a week again. It’s an injustice. That’s all I can say. We want oral arguments and we want 60 years of labor law to be applied,” Suggs said.

An NLRB spokeswoman said the board rarely grants oral arguments in cases, instead preferring to rely on briefs by attorneys and the written record. Failing to grant oral argument doesn’t mean the board will rule one way or the other, the spokeswoman said.

“Cases are decided on the written record and filings,” said Patricia Gilbert, a Washington-based spokeswoman for the NLRB. “As far as the agency is concerned, due process has occurred. … We have no way of knowing where the decision will fall until the ruling is released.”

Kentucky River Community Care Inc. operated the Caney Creek Development Complex in Kentucky, a nonprofit mental health facility. The complex wanted to categorize six nurses as supervisors, making them ineligible to join a union.

The NLRB board found that the six weren’t supervisors because they weren’t truly exercising “independent judgment” in directing the work of other employees, a requirement under law that defines someone as a supervisor.

Instead, the board said the nurses were nonsupervisors because they exercised “ordinary professional or technical judgment” in directing the work of other employees.

A federal appeals court overruled the board, a decision that was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in a 2001 opinion.

The Supreme Court said the board’s interpretation could exempt most supervisors. “What supervisory judgment worth exercising, one must wonder, does not rest on 'professional or technical skill or experience,’ ” Justice Antonin

Scalia wrote for the court majority.

In light of that decision, the NLRB invited interested parties to file amicus briefs in three additional labor cases that, while separate from the Kentucky River case, involve some of the same labor issues.

The board asked parties to argue the meaning of “independent judgment.” For example, “What is the degree of discretion required for supervisory status?”

“A broad interpretation of who is a 'supervisor’ could allow employers to strip hundreds of thousands of workers of their right to union protection,” the West Central Florida Federation of Labor said in a statement Monday.

“The impact is likely to be particularly dramatic in the health care industry, in construction and in other skilled occupations where it is common for higher skilled workers to direct the work of lower skilled employees,” the federation said.

Edward Dees, president of the Florida Gulf Coast Building and Construction Trades Council in Tampa, a group of 15 trade unions, said a broad interpretation of “supervisor” would widen the gap between rich and poor. “We beg the working people of this country to come together to show support against the Bush administration,” he said.

Among those attending the rally were several politicians, including Hillsborough County Commissioner Kathy Castor, state Sen. Les Miller, D-Tampa, and Rick Penberthy, a Democrat running for Ginny Brown-Waite’s U.S. House seat.

William R. Levesque can be reached at levesque@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3436.

[Last modified July 10, 2006, 21:45:37]