I interrupt my vacation to bring you this breaking news. The NLRB has ruled against News-Press owner Wendy McCaw. The Board has unanimously found that the publisher of the Santa Barbara News-Press committed multiple unfair labor practices during a union organizing campaign by newsroom employees, and ordered the paper's parent company Ampersand Publishing LLC to offer reinstatement to eight fired journalists, among other remedies.
The decision largely upholds a 2007 ruling by Administrative Law Judge William G. Kocol, which the publisher appealed. “The judge found that the Respondent engaged in an extensive campaign of retaliatory conduct against employees because they exercised their rights to seek union representation and to join together for their mutual aid or protection. Our order remedies that unlawful conduct,” the decision states.
The Board ordered the News-Press to cease and desist from the illegal activity, and to take the following affirmative remedial steps: offer reinstatement to eight employees, including six who hung a banner from a footbridge urging motorists to cancel their newspaper subscription and two others who were ostensibly fired for ‘biased reporting’; rescind discriminatory evaluations of four union supporters; rescind suspension notices sent to eleven employees; and make all discriminated employees whole with backpay awards.
Here is a link to the full decision.
Hee is a link to the NLRB's press release.
Now, back to my east coast vacation.
© 2011 by Craig Smith and www.craigsmithsblog.com
