Flo-Tronic Metal Mfg., Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Aug 27, 1980

251 N.L.R.B. 1546 (N.L.R.B. 1980)

1546 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Flo-Tronic Metal Mfg., Inc. and United Steelwork-
ers of America, AFL-CIO, Petitioner. Case 21-
RC-16235
August 27, 1980
DECISION AND DIRECTION OF
SECOND ELECTION
BY CHAIRMAN FANNING AND MEMBERS
PENELLO AND TRUESDALE
Pursuant to authority granted it by the National
Labor Relations Board under Section 3(b) of the
National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a three-
member panel has considered objections in an elec-
tion held March 7, 1980, and the Regional Direc-
tor's report recommending disposition of same. The
Board has reviewed the record in light of the ex-
ceptions and brief, and hereby adopts the Regional
Director's findings only to the extent consistent
herewith.
The Employer, in Objection 5, alleges that the
election should be set aside because, as a result of a
mistake by the Board's Regional Office, the notices
which were posted were in English although the
majority of the unit can only understand and read
Spanish. The Regional Director recommended the
objection be overruled. We disagree. '
The parties agreed at the representation hearing
that bilingual notices would be posted. On Febru-
ary 26, 1980, Region 21 mailed a packet of notices
of election, containing both English and Spanish
notices. However, because the packet was misad-
dressed they were apparently not received by the
Employer until after the election. 2 In the mean-
time, on February 28, 1980, the Employer's counsel
called the Regional Office to request that some no-
tices be hand delivered. That same day notices
were delivered which were in English only, except
that the central panel contained information in
Spanish and English regarding the mechanical de-
tails of the election. These notices were immediate-
ly posted.
The Regional Director, in recommending that
the objection be overruled, relied on the fact that
the unit description, the place, date and time of the
election, the sample ballot, and the ballots were in
In view of our disposition of this objection, we find iit unnecessary to
pass on the remaining objections
2 Trwo witnesses were presented who claim they saw E mployer'\ presi-
dent, Frank Spitzer, with the Spanish notice the day of the elctiol No
one presented any evidence indicating that the Spanish notice as ever
posted
3 Spitzer states that, inasmuch as tile parties had agreed to the bilingual
notices, when he saw the Spanish contained ithin the central panel of
the hand-delivered notices he presumed he had receised the bilingual ma-
terial
251 NLRB No. 205
both English and Spanish. Thus, he found that the
employees through this means and through the
campaigns of the Employer and the Petitioner
would be informed of the essential elements neces-
sary to cast an informed ballot. Further, he noted
that there was no evidence that employees were
deprived of the right to vote or that employees did
not understand that election was to be conducted
by a Federal agency and that each employee
would have an opportunity to cast a secret ballot.
Therefore he concluded that the posting of the
English notice which set forth the essential ele-
ments of the election did not interfere with the
election.
The difficulty with the Regional Director's rea-
soning is that it fails to take into account the other
statements on the notice. Thus, the Board's official
election notice contains in addition to information
with respect to date, time and place of polling, eli-
gibility requirements, and the type of ballot to be
used, important information with respect to the
rights of employees, the purpose of which is to
alert them as to their rights under the Act and to
warn unions and management alike against conduct
impeding a free and fair election.4 This letter infor-
mation was only in English on the notice posted
herein. As a result, those employees who could not
understand English were unable to read the infor-
mation regarding their rights. Thus, the posting of
the notice here was, with respect to those who un-
derstand no English, essentially the equivalent of
the posting of a part of a notice with important
statements left out. We find that the failure to in-
clude in the notice a full statement of rights of em-
ployees in both English and Spanish as agreed to
by the parties5 constitutes interference with the
election which requires that the election be set
aside. 6
ORDER
It is hereby ordered that the election held on
March 7, 1980, be, and it hereby is, set aside.
[Direction of Second Election and Excelsior foot-
note omitted from publication.]
Overland Hauling. Inc.. 168 NLRB 870 (1968)
N orwesern Products. Inc., 226 NLRB 653 (1976). is distinguishable in
that there the parties agreed that the notice ;would be in English only and
there were additional facts tending to show that the use of English onily
notices (and ballots) could not have had an adverse impact on the elec-
tiion Member Penello., who dissented in N.orwestern Product.. inds no sig-
nificani distinctions between that case and the present case In both cases,
he finds that the failure to assure foreign language-speaking employees
the opportunity to make an informed choice interfered with the election
' See Fibre Leathe Manufacturing Corporaton, 167 NI.RB 193 (1967}