Wal-Mart labor trial under way in Vegas

Grace Leong

Thursday, Jan. 17, 2002 | 11:14 a.m.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., charged with labor law violations in its fight against a union organizing drive at 14 Las Vegas stores, accused the union Wednesday of being more concerned with "protecting its market share than vindicating workers' rights."

At a hearing that began Tuesday at the National Labor Relations Board, Wal-Mart attorney Steven Wheeless described Las Vegas as "ground zero for the UFCW's (United Food and Commerial Workers Union) multimillion dollar organizing effort" and accused the union of trying to portray Wal-Mart as a bad employer by filing waves of labor law complaints against the giant retailer.

A complaint filed by the NLRB -- based on union claims -- alleges that more than 20 management personnel at three Las Vegas Wal-Mart stores at 3615 S. Rainbow Blvd., 3075 E. Tropicana Ave. and 1807 W. Craig Road disparaged workers who showed union support and told them they weren't worthy of working at Wal-Mart or invited them to quit.

Workers were allegedly threatened with a loss of benefits if they showed union support and were allegedly prohibited from soliciting for the union at other workers' homes or distributing union literature.

But Wheeless cast doubts on the credibility and validity of the claims leveled by the government and the union.

"The UFCW's ulterior motive is not secret. For every Wal-Mart Supercenter or Sam's Club that opens and isn't unionized, market share is taken from the UFCW, so it's not surprising that the UFCW is trying to organize Wal-Mart," he said. "More than 100 unfair labor practice charges have been filed by the UFCW against six Wal-Mart and Sam's Club stores in the past one year. The purpose is to create an impression that Wal-Mart is a bad employer that violates employee rights and that these employees need protection and the UFCW is the one to provide such protection."

But Harold Embry, assistant to the director for the UFCW's Strategic Programs department, disagreed, saying there are more unfair labor charges filed against Wal-Mart in Las Vegas than in any other city because "workers here have a greater general knowledge of unions" and because of strong pro-union sympathies.

The UFCW, which has a membership of about 8,000 members in the Las Vegas area, launched a national organizing drive of some 8,000 workers in Wal-Mart and Sam's Club stores in Las Vegas in October 2000. The UFCW held its first organizing drive of Wal-Mart in Jacksonville, Texas, in 1999 and won an election in February 2000 to represent 12 meat cutters. But the union hasn't successfully negotiated any bargaining contracts in any city so far.

The union, which filed its first election request on Sept. 19 for a 230-worker Sam's Club store at 7175 W. Spring Mountain Road in Las Vegas, said a vote by 213 workers in November was postponed after the union brought unfair labor charges against Sam's Club on Nov. 27. The election hasn't been rescheduled yet because of a pending investigation of the new charges.

Christyne Neff, assistant general counsel of the UFCW International in Washington D.C., said Wal-Mart violated federal labor laws when it allegedly denied workers the use of its break room as a "safe haven" for union activities and disciplined several workers including Avis Hammond, a former Wal-Mart greeter, allegedly for distributing handbills.

"Break rooms are supposed to be safe territory for workers to talk about unions, but an increasing presence of Wal-Mart managers made the area unsafe ... and workers are cut off from opportunities to find safe havens for their union activities," she said.

Nathan Albright, the NLRB's field attorney, agreed, saying "the increased presence" of Wal-Mart managers surveying union activity in the break rooms at the three stores is unusual and began only after the UFCW stepped up its organizing drive in Las Vegas.

But Wheeless said Wal-Mart has at least 14 witnesses that will refute the idea that break rooms were used as surveillance areas by its managers.

"We have only one break room in each store, and it's used by both supervisors and workers. The managers were using the break room routinely long before workers used it for solicitation and distribution of union materials," he said. "The workers knew they could not distribute and solicit in work areas because that's a violation of federal labor laws and they weren't disciplined for union activity in the break rooms."

Albright said labor laws were violated when Diana Griego, a former Wal-Mart sales floor associate at the Tropicana store, and several other workers were denied access to off-duty workers while trying to hand out union literature at the store. Griego, who applied for a position as a Wal-Mart pharmacy cashier, was rejected allegedly because of her support for the union, he said.

The union also accused Wal-Mart of causing a healthcare provider of a worker, Norine Sorensen, to refuse to grant her a full medical release to stop her from returning to work. Sorensen was on a mandatory leave of absence and could not return to work without that release.

Albright said Sorensen was "singled out and treated differently" because she was a union supporter.

But Wheeless disputed the NLRB and the union's claims, saying the workers' motives, biases and self-interest have to be examined to determine if their allegations are credible.

"Sorensen claims she was discriminatorily put on mandatory leave of absence," he said. "But what she really wants is money for an injury she claims is work-related and she was denied three times by an appeals officer when she tried to get that compensation."

The trial on the NLRB's charges, which is being presided over by administrative law judge Albert A. Metz, is expected to last about three weeks. The government said it will depose the three stores' management personnel Robert Knickerbocker, Mark Dutton and Nate Owens in hopes of proving that they engaged in illegal surveillance of workers' union activity. Hammond and Griego will be deposed by Wal-Mart.

"Ultimately the government wants Wal-Mart to remedy what it alleges to be wrongful conduct including a failure to award jobs to qualified employees, verbally reprimanding employees or interrogating employees that show union support," said Mike Chavez, NLRB's resident officer.

"The remedy includes rescinding those policies that are unlawful and removing from files unwarranted written reprimands. If Wal-Mart should persist on a course of (wrongful) conduct, the NLRB could go to federal district court to get an injunction," he said. "There are no punitive damages that can be sought under the NLRB Act, just actual damages."

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