Albert Lea Select Foods, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Unpublished Board Decisions

Aug 10, 2011

18-RC-017746 (N.L.R.B. Aug. 10, 2011)

NOT TO BE INCLUDED LBP
IN BOUND VOLUMES Albert Lea, MN
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
BEFORE THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
ALBERT LEA SELECT FOODS, INC.
Employer
and Case 18-RC-17746
UNITED FOOD AND COMMERCIAL
WORKERS UNION, LOCAL 6
Petitioner
DECISION AND CERTIFICATION OF REPRESENTATIVE
The National Labor Relations Board, by a three-member panel, has considered
objections to an election held March 11, 2011, and the Regional Director’s report
recommending disposition of them.[1] The election was conducted pursuant to a
Stipulated Election Agreement. The tally of ballots shows 215 for and 206 against the
Petitioner, with 2 challenged ballots, an insufficient number to affect the results.
The Board has reviewed the record in light of the exceptions and has adopted the
Regional Director’s findings and recommendations, and finds that a certification of
representative should be issued.
CERTIFICATION OF REPRESENTATIVE
IT IS CERTIFIED that a majority of the valid ballots have been cast for United Food and
Commercial Workers Union, Local 6 and that it is the exclusive collective-bargaining
representative of the employees in the following appropriate unit:
All full-time and regular part-time production and maintenance employees
employed by the Employer at its Albert Lea, Minnesota facility; excluding
quality assurance employees, trainers, sanitation employees, professional
2
employees, office clerical employees, managers, all other employees, and
guards and supervisors as defined in the Act, as amended.
Dated, Washington, D.C., August 10, 2011.
___________________________
Wilma B. Liebman, Chairman
___________________________
Craig Becker, Member
____________________________
Mark Gaston Pearce, Member

(SEAL) NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
[1] Contrary to the Employer’s Objection 1, we find that the Regional Director did
not abuse his discretion by not providing interpreters for non-English speaking voters in
the polling area, by not allowing multilingual observers for the parties to act as
interpreters in that area, and/or by requiring that oral communications by Board agents
and the parties’ observers in the voting area be in English. Given the number of
languages that employees spoke, and hence the number of translators that would have
been required in the voting area, we credit the reasonableness of the Regional Director’s
“sole concern” of ensuring “that the Board Agents conducting the election were in
control of the process, including being able to understand everything said to employees
while they were in the polling place by anyone connected with assisting in the election.”
In addition, we find that the Regional Director’s provision of the notice of election and
ballots in all relevant languages (except for not translating the ballot into Thai) and use of
multilingual individuals to release employees to vote, together with the parties’ own
multilingual efforts to inform employees of their choice to vote for or against
representation by the Petitioner and concerning the mechanics of voting, render quite
remote any possibility that a determinative number of voters might have been adversely
affected by the Regional Director’s actions objected to by the Employer. Further, we find
that the Employer provided no evidence as to why, in light of the foregoing, the failure to
translate the ballots into Thai was objectionable.