Union-organizing activities at restaurants are on the rise, as labor groups prepare to benefit from possible changes to federal labor law.
In anticipation that Congress this year will support the Employee Free Choice Act, pro-labor groups already have been surveying workers and collecting information at New Orleans eateries. Meanwhile, select Burger King units were picketed in mid-February because of the Miami-based parent’s perceived opposition to so-called “card check” legislation.
As proposed, the bill would eliminate the current private-ballot elections over-seen by the National Labor Relations Board and allow a workplace to organize if a majority of employees sign a card in favor of union representation.
This is the second time the act has come before federal lawmakers. It was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in 2008 by a vote of 241-185, but was narrowly defeated in the Senate.
Organized labor and other supporters said the act would prevent employers from intimidating workers prior to a union election. Businesses said it would allow union organizers to intimidate employees into signing the cards by denying them the right to private elections.
“If this were to pass, it would have a drastic impact on restaurants and small businesses as a whole,” said Jim Funk, president and chief executive of the Louisiana Restaurant Association, whose members have seen recent union organizing in their restaurants.
“It’s an extremely important issue to us,” said Beth Johnson, executive vice president of public affairs for the National Restaurant Association. “Timing is up in the air. The intelligence we are getting is that the House does not want to go first. They are concerned the Senate may change the bill.”
Brendan Flanagan, the NRA’s vice president of federal relations, is hopeful that the restaurant industry’s lobbying efforts against the measure are paying off.
“They are having trouble in both houses generating the number of co-sponsors they had last time, which is a direct reflection of the industry’s sustained grassroots engagement for several months,” he said.
Labor groups also are lobbying aggressively. Dozens of picketers from the Service Employees International Union and allied organizations protested at Burger King units Feb. 19, citing the parent company’s lobbying efforts against the Employee Free Choice Act.
Burger King, however, said it neither opposes nor supports the bill.
“Burger King Corp. believes unions serve a purpose in some workplaces, and a number of its guests, vendors and franchisees have positive union membership experiences,” the company said in a statement. “BKC is not anti-union. BKC and its franchisees serve a diverse consumer base and, therefore, aim to remain neutral on political issues.”
Other restaurateurs also have felt targeted in the recent past. Operators in New Orleans say unions have stepped up their intelligence-gathering efforts.
“They are laying the groundwork for an organizing effort should this bill get passed,” said Ralph Brennan, owner of Ralph’s on the Park in New Orleans and former chairman of the NRA. “They were collecting names and e-mail addresses and things like that.”
Funk of the LRA said a group affiliated with the Tulane University business school last November was going into restaurants to conduct surveys on wages, work conditions and benefits.
“The restaurants gave them the go-ahead, thinking they were helping college students out,” he said.
Instead, the survey group turned out to be affiliated with the Restaurant Opportunities Center, or ROC, of New Orleans, a branch of ROC-New York, Funk said. ROC-New York’s goal is to bring justice to the city’s restaurant workplaces. ROC also has a presence in Miami, Chicago, Detroit, and Portland, Maine, and Washington, D.C.
ROC-New Orleans delivered Valentine’s Day candy to Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., urging her to support raising the tipped minimum wage. Landrieu, one of few Democrats in the Louisiana congressional delegation, is considered a crucial vote on card check in the Senate.
“We’re asking her to vote against cloture [moving the legislation forward to a vote] every time it comes up,” Funk said.
There were about 45,500 restaurant workers in the New Orleans area as of Dec. 31, 2008. By late February the union activity had slowed, Funk said.
“But we can’t keep our guard down,” he said. “We tell our restaurants that they should be sure they have a good employee manual, make sure they have a no-solicitation policy and a grievance procedure, so if an employee has a complaint they have a way to get it answered.”
Brennan said talking to employees is a good way to learn about these activities and keep staff happy.
Meanwhile, the NRA is urging its members to continue lobbying their congressmen to vote against the Employee Free Choice Act.
Flanagan said operators should be highly concerned about the proposed act’s provision for binding arbitration.
“After a period of time, if a union bargaining unit and an employer can’t agree on labor terms, a federal arbitrator would have the ability to determine all wages, working conditions and benefits for the employer and employee for up to a two-year period,” he said. “Clearly, in these difficult economic times having your employer and employee tied to a set piece of working conditions really denies them any flexibility to respond when tough economic times confront them.”
