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Parties Involved:
COMAR Management, Inc.
Petitioner
Halle Enterprises, Inc.
Petitioner
National Labor Relations Board
Respondent

Document Text:

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued March 13, 2001 Decided April 27, 2001

No. 00-1325

Halle Enterprises, Inc. and COMAR Management, Inc.,

Petitioners

v.

National Labor Relations Board,

Respondent

Fidel Perez, et al.,

Intervenors

On Petition for Review and Cross-Application for

Enforcement of an Order of the National

Labor Relations Board

Fred S. Sommer argued the cause and filed the briefs for

petitioner. James E. McCollum, Jr. entered an appearance.

Ruth E. Burdick, Attorney, National Labor Relations

Board, argued the cause for respondent. With her on the

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brief were Leonard R. Page, General Counsel, John H.

Ferguson, Associate General Counsel, Aileen A. Armstrong,

Deputy Associate General Counsel, and Margaret A. Gaines,

Supervisory Attorney.

James E. McCollum, Jr. was on the brief for intervenors

Fidel Perez, et al.

Before: Sentelle, Tatel and Garland, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge Garland.

Garland, Circuit Judge: The National Labor Relations

Board issued an order requiring Halle Enterprises, Inc. to

reinstate and make whole eleven employees whom the company had fired for complaining about wages, hours, and working

conditions. The question before us is whether the company's

voluntary offer of reinstatement to four of the employees

tolled their right to backpay. The Board held that it did not,

because the offer was not firm, clear, and unconditional.

Substantial evidence supports the Board's finding, and we

therefore deny the company's petition for review and grant

the Board's cross-application for enforcement of its order.

I

Halle Enterprises is in the business of building homes and

managing apartment complexes. On the morning of November 4, 1997, eleven of the company's maintenance technicians

complained to their supervisor about wages, hours, and working conditions, including the unavailability of safety equipment. Not long thereafter, Wayne Ellis, the company's

property manager, arrived on the scene and fired all eleven

workers. The next day, November 5, Ellis told the employees that they could have their jobs back if they filled out new

applications. When the employees learned that Ellis' offer

did not include their current benefits and seniority, they

refused.

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) held that

Halle Enterprises violated section 8(a)(1) of the National

Labor Relations Act by firing the eleven employees on November 4. Halle Enters., Inc., 330 N.L.R.B. No. 163, 2000

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WL 363063, at *1, 4 (March 31, 2000).1 The Board also found

that on or about November 7, Warren Halle, the company's

president, told Israel Flores, the employees' spokesman, that

he wanted the four most senior technicians to come back to

work without any conditions. The Board further determined,

however, that when the four attempted to return to work on

or about November 10, they were met by Ellis, who told them

they could retain their current benefits and seniority only if

they signed a waiver agreeing not to participate in legal

action against the company. When the four senior employees

refused to sign the waiver, Ellis told them they could not

return to work.

The NLRB's Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) had determined that Warren Halle's unconditional offer tolled the

company's obligation to pay the four employees backpay as of

November 7, despite Ellis' subsequent insistence that they

sign a waiver as a condition of reinstatement. The Board

disagreed with the ALJ. It held that Ellis' subsequent

demand superseded Halle's initial offer and rendered the

company's offer conditional. Halle Enters., 2000 WL 363063,

at *2 & n.8. The Board found that at the time the employees

reported for reinstatement, they had "every reason to conclude" that Ellis was stating the full terms of the company's

offer, "including any amendments that might have been made

to Halle's offer since it was originally made." Id. at *2 n.8.

The Board ordered reinstatement and full backpay for all

eleven discharged workers.

II

When the NLRB determines that an employer has unlawfully discharged an employee, its normal course is to issue a

make-whole order requiring reinstatement and backpay. See

Darr v. NLRB, 801 F.2d 1404, 1407 (D.C. Cir. 1986); Roma

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1 Section 8(a)(1), 29 U.S.C. s 158(a)(1), makes it an unfair labor

practice "to interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the

exercise of the rights guaranteed" in section 7 of the Act, which

include the right to engage in concerted activities for the purpose of

"mutual aid or protection," 29 U.S.C. s 157.

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One Enters., 325 N.L.R.B. 851, 852, 853 (1998); F.W. Woolworth Co., 90 N.L.R.B. 289, 291 (1950); see also Sure-Tan,

Inc. v. NLRB, 467 U.S. 883, 902 (1984). An employer's offer

of reinstatement tolls the accrual of backpay, but only if the

offer is "firm, clear, and unconditional." Consol. Freightways

v. NLRB, 892 F.2d 1052, 1056 (D.C. Cir. 1989) (quoting

Lipman Bros., Inc., 164 N.L.R.B. 850, 853 (1967)); accord

Krist Oil Co., 328 N.L.R.B. No. 108, 1999 WL 448441, at *5

(June 28, 1999). "It is the employer's burden to establish

that it made a valid offer of reinstatement." Roma One

Enters., 325 N.L.R.B. at 852.

Halle Enterprises concedes that it committed an unfair

labor practice by discharging the eleven employees. It challenges neither the Board's order requiring their reinstatement, nor the mandate to provide full backpay for the seven

junior technicians. The company attacks the order only to

the extent that it awards backpay to the four senior employees subsequent to the date of Halle's reinstatement offer.

The company does not dispute that Ellis' offer was conditional, and that if his was the last offer received by the four

senior technicians, it would have superseded Halle's offer and

prevented tolling of their backpay. The company contends,

however, that it was Halle's offer that came last.

According to company counsel, the only issue in this case is

whether the Board was correct in finding that Ellis' conditional offer was the last one communicated to the employees. We

adopt this formulation of the issue on appeal with one caveat.

Our role is not to determine de novo whether the Board's

factual finding was correct. Rather, we are limited to determining whether it is "supported by substantial evidence on

the record considered as a whole." 29 U.S.C. s 160(e); see

Universal Camera Corp. v. NLRB, 340 U.S. 474, 477, 488

(1951). To that end, we ask only "whether on this record it

would have been possible for a reasonable jury to reach the

Board's conclusion." Capital Cleaning Contractors, Inc. v.

NLRB, 147 F.3d 999, 1004 (D.C. Cir. 1998) (quoting Allentown Mack Sales & Serv., Inc. v. NLRB, 522 U.S. 359, 366-67

(1998)). And in making that determination, we give "substantial deference to the inferences drawn by the NLRB from the

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facts." Time Warner Cable v. NLRB, 160 F.3d 1, 3 (D.C.

Cir. 1998).

We conclude that there is substantial evidence to support

the Board's finding. Israel Flores testified that Ellis' November 10 offer of reinstatement, which included the waiver

condition, was the last offer the employees received from the

company. J.A. 66, 68-69. Warren Halle himself testified

that he "probably" made his unconditional offer two or three

days after the November 4 incident, J.A. 187, which the ALJ

concluded put it on or about November 7--several days

before Ellis' conditional offer of November 10. Halle Enters.,

2000 WL 363063, at *5.

The company's only response is that, notwithstanding

Halle's testimony, it was logically impossible for him to have

made his unconditional offer until after Ellis insisted upon a

waiver on November 10. The company notes that Halle

testified he told Flores that the employees would not have to

sign anything in order to return to work, and that the ALJ

credited that testimony. Id. at *5. It would not have been

logical for Halle to have referred to the signing of a document, the company argues, unless Ellis' insistence upon a

waiver had come before.

This purported inconsistency within the testimony of the

employer's own president is a weak reed upon which to base a

claim that the NLRB lacks substantial evidence to support its

factual finding. In any event, there is no logical conundrum

here. The company's argument assumes that November 10

was the first time Ellis told the employees they would have to

sign a waiver in order to regain their jobs. But one of the

fired employees, Jose Alfaro, testified that Ellis first made

that demand the day after the firings--November 5--when

he offered all eleven employees reinstatement, but without

benefits or seniority. See J.A. 93 (Alfaro Tr.) ("[H]e told us

... that we were going to lose all of our benefits, and that he

wanted us to sign a note stating that there was nothing that

we could do against the company."). The company did not

cross-examine Alfaro on the point, and offered no rebuttal.

Moreover, Halle did not testify as to how or when he learned

of the waiver requirement, nor even expressly associate it

with Ellis.

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In light of the above, Halle's testimony plainly does not

render it impossible "for a reasonable jury to reach the

Board's conclusion" that Ellis' conditional offer of November

10 was the last one the employees received. Allentown

Mack, 522 U.S. at 367. Accordingly, we have no cause to

displace this finding of fact. Indeed, that is particularly so

since it is undisputed that "the burden is on the [employer] to

communicate to its employees an offer that is firm, clear, and

unconditional." Halle Enters., 2000 WL 363063, at *2.

III

One final loose end remains to be secured. In addition to

Halle and Ellis, a third manager--Vice President Joe Dodson--also made an offer of reinstatement to the four senior

employees. The ALJ found, however, that Dodson's offer

was conditional, and was made after Halle's unconditional

offer and before Ellis' conditional one. Halle Enters., 2000

WL 363063, at *4, 5 & n.7. The Board affirmed. Id. at *1, 2.

The company disputes the ALJ's findings on both counts,

contending that Dodson's offer was unconditional and that it

came after Ellis'. But even if Dodson intended his offer to be

unconditional, its wording hardly met the employer's burden

of communicating an offer that was "firm, clear, and unconditional." Consol. Freightways, 892 F.2d at 1056; Roma One

Enters., 325 N.L.R.B. at 852.2 We need not belabor the

point, however, as there is substantial evidence to support the

Board's finding that Ellis' offer was the last one the employees received.3 Since it is undisputed that under Ellis' offer,

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2 According to Dodson, he told the employees: "You would

return under the same conditions that you left insofar as salary,

benefits. The only thing that they would not receive is any money

for time away from their job. No other conditions were made."

J.A. 177 (emphasis added).

3 See J.A. 65-69 (Flores Tr.) (testifying that, although Dodson

said the four senior employees should go back to work, when they

arrived Ellis insisted upon a waiver, and that thereafter the company did not again offer reinstatement); J.A. 162 (Medina Tr.)

(testifying that, although Dodson said he wanted the four to go back

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reinstatement was improperly conditioned upon the signing of

a waiver, Dodson's earlier offer simply does not affect the

employees' right to backpay.

IV

Substantial evidence supports the NLRB's determination

that the ultimate offer of reinstatement made by Halle Enterprises to its unlawfully discharged employees was conditional.

As a consequence, that offer did not toll the employees'

entitlement to backpay. We therefore deny the petition for

review and grant the Board's cross-application for enforcement.

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to work, when they came to the office Ellis required them to sign

the waiver document before starting).

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