Source: http://ny.findacase.com/research/wfrmDocViewer.aspx/xq/fac.19961220_0000800.SNY.htm/qx
Timestamp: 2017-06-26 17:44:33
Document Index: 608666335

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 10', '§ 160', '§ 10', '§ 160', '§ 8', '§ 8', '§ 2']

| SILVERMAN EX REL. NLRB v. LOCAL 78
SILVERMAN EX REL. NLRB v. LOCAL 78
DANIEL SILVERMAN, REGIONAL DIRECTOR, Region 2 of the National Labor Relations Board, for and on behalf of the NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD, Petitioner, against LOCAL 78, ASBESTOS, LEAD AND HAZARDOUS WASTE LABORERS, AFFILIATED WITH THE MASON TENDERS DISTRICT COUNCIL OF GREATER NEW YORK AND THE LABORERS' INTERNATIONAL UNION OF NORTH AMERICA, AFL-CIO, Respondent.
FINDINGS OF FACT and CONCLUSIONS OF LAW JOHN F. KEENAN, United States District Judge: Before the Court is the petition of Daniel Silverman, Regional Director of the Second Region of the National Labor Relations Board, for and on behalf of the National Labor Relations Board (the "NLRB"), for a temporary injunction pursuant to § 10(l) of the National Labor Relations Act (the "NLRA"), 29 U.S.C. § 160(l), pending final adjudication of a charge before the Board brought by AIA Environmental Corp. ("AIA") against respondent Local 78, Asbestos, Lead and Hazardous Waste Laborers, Affiliated with the Mason Tenders District Council of Greater New York and the Laborers' International Union of North America, AFL-CIO ("Local 78" or the "union") in Case No. 2-CP-937. Specifically, Petitioner seeks an order enjoining Local 78 from picketing, threatening to picket, or causing AIA to be picketed at any AIA job sites where the object of the picketing is to force AIA to recognize or bargain with Local 78 or any other labor organization as the representative of its employees pending resolution of the NLRB matter. Petitioner Silverman moved by Order to Show Cause on December 10, 1996 for the relief sought herein. The Court set December 13, 1996 as the date for an evidentiary hearing. Local 78 filed a memorandum of law in opposition to Petitioner's application on December 13, 1996. The parties thereafter informed the Court that there was no need or desire for an evidentiary hearing; thus, only oral argument was heard on December 13, 1996. Petitioner submitted reply papers on December 18, 1996. For the reasons that follow, the motion for a temporary injunction is granted. FINDINGS OF FACT Petitioner Daniel Silverman, the Regional Director of the Second Region of the NLRB, brings this petition on the NLRB's behalf, pursuant to § 10(l) of the NLRA, 29 U.S.C. § 160(l). Petitioner seeks injunctive relief pending the final disposition of a matter before the NLRB in which AIA charges that members of Local 78 engaged in, and continue to engage in, unfair labor practices within the meaning of § 8(b)(7)(C) of the NLRA. AIA filed the charge with the NLRB on November 18, 1996. The question for the Court is whether petitioner has reasonable cause to believe that Local 78's picketing of AIA job sites violated NLRA § 8(b)(7)(c) such that the issuance of a temporary injunction would be just and proper. The facts affecting this determination are largely undisputed and are as follows.
Local 78 is a union having its principal office at 30 Cliff Street, New York, New York. It is a "labor organization" within the meaning of § 2(5) of the NLRA in that its purpose is, inter alia, to organize unrepresented employees and to represent its members with employers concerning wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment. AIA is a New York corporation with offices at 20-29 38th Street, Astoria, New York. It is engaged in the business of asbestos removal, lead paint abatement, soil remediation, and the cleaning of underground storage tanks, and generates over $ 50,000 in income annually from customers located within and outside the State of New York. Although AIA has, in the past, entered into site specific agreements with certain unions, it is not a party to a collective bargaining agreement with any labor organization. On March 1, 1996, a representative of Local 78, Pawell Kedzior, met with Emil Braun, President of AIA. At the meeting, Mr. Kedzior demanded that AIA recognize and enter into a collective bargaining agreement with Local 78 covering any and all work performed by AIA involving the removal, abatement, encapsulation, or decontamination of asbestos, lead, or other toxic or hazardous waste or materials in the five boroughs of New York and in Suffolk and Nassau counties. Mr. Braun refused Mr. Kedzior's demand on the basis that AIA's employees had expressed to him that they did not wish to be represented by Local 78. Mr. Braun also maintains that under the terms of the collective bargaining agreement Local 78 offered AIA, the corporation could not continue in business. See Braun Aff. P 12. In late July 1996, Local 78 representative Sal Speziale reiterated Mr. Kedzior's previous demand that AIA enter into a collective bargaining agreement with the union. Mr. Braun again refused the union's demand. Mr. Speziale then stated that the union would have to resort to "other methods" to change AIA's position. In August 1996, Mr. Speziale and representatives of General Building Laborers Local 79, also affiliated with Mason Tenders District Council of Greater New York and the Laborers' International Union of North America, AFL-CIO ("Local 79"), together with approximately forty supporters of those labor organizations, picketed AIA at a job site on 180 Water Street, New York, New York, where AIA was performing asbestos removal work. The picketers blew whistles and screamed "union yes." Petitioner contends that the picketers also blocked entrances to the job site for one day. Local 78 representatives Tim Warrington and Kazmir Proznuiuski, at AIA's job site at 180 Water Street, thereafter demanded of Bruce Carley, Senior Project Manager of AIA, that AIA enter into the collective bargaining agreement with Local 78. Mr. Carley responded that he was not in a position of authority to comment on that situation on AIA's behalf. Thereafter, on nearly every day in August 1996, Local 78 and Local 79 representatives approached Mr. Carley at the job site at 180 Water Street as well as at other job sites and told him that they would not cease their demands of him until AIA signed a collective bargaining agreement with Local 78. Local 78 continued its demands of AIA through its representative Tim Warrington at an AIA jobsite at 535 Fifth Avenue in mid-August 1996. Mr. Warrington also sought to compel a representative of Axiom Real Estate Management, the company which had hired AIA to do asbestos removal, to remove AIA from the job by threatening to picket the jobsite if such action was not taken. In September 1996, AIA entered into an asbestos removal contract with Northrup Grumman Corporation ("NGC") concerning premises in Bethpage, New York. By letter dated September 1996, Local 78's attorney, Andrew Gorlick, wrote to NGC, informing that corporation that the Mason Tenders District Council of Greater New York (the "Mason Tenders"), of which Local 78 is a part, sought a collective bargaining agreement with AIA. Mr. Gorlick further informed NGC that the Mason Tenders ...