Opinion ID: 627393
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: The Home's Discriminatory Treatment and Discharge of LPN Brenda Toothman

Text: 65 LPN Brenda Toothman was an early and open supporter of the union. She was one of three Home employees who initially contacted the Teamsters, she organized the July 5 meeting in the park, distributed authorization cards at work, and otherwise actively campaigned for union representation. 66 Under the August 10 work schedule, Toothman was moved from the 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. shift, where she had worked for a year and a half, to the 3 p.m. to 11 p.m. shift. When she asked Nursing Director Turpin why she had been moved to an evening shift when two part-time employees, LPN Rosemary Stretch and Paula Rentfro had been given a day shift, Turpin responded that the day shift was the only one that Stretch and Rentfro had agreed to work. When Toothman reminded her that she, too, had agreed to work only the 7 to 3 shift, Turpin relied, That's the way it is. Previously, when she worked at the Home as a temporary employee, Toothman had been told by Turpin that temporary employees accumulated no seniority rights or benefits. 67 On November 5, 1990, Toothman took medical leave to undergo surgery for carpel tunnel syndrome. She had taken a leave of absence the previous April for the same surgical procedure, returning afterwards to her full-time position on the day shift. Before leaving in November, she presented the Home with a medical note giving January 2, 1991 as her return date. Administrator Wimer and Turpin signed the note. 68 On December 27, when she was ready to return to work, Toothman presented a medical release to Florence Glenn, the Home's new Nursing Director and Turpin's replacement. Glenn told Toothman that there was no opening for her at that time and that she had relinquished all seniority rights when she took medical leave. 20 When Toothman stated that she had previously been reinstated after taking medical leave, Glenn responded that she was only following the Home's policy as set forth in the employee handbook. 69 On January 7, Glenn met with Toothman and handed her a job evaluation dated December 27, completed by an RN staff nurse (serving in the capacity of acting nursing director) and Administrator Wimer. Usually, nurses' evaluations were performed by the director and assistant director of nursing; Wimer had never before evaluated Toothman's job performance. The evaluation contained lower ratings than Toothman had previously received, including a substandard grade for Attitude, even though she had not been the subject of a reprimand or disciplinary action. 70 During their meeting, Glenn offered Toothman a full-time position on the 3 to 11 shift. Toothman accepted, but complained that she should have been allowed to return to her position on the day shift in light of her seniority over nearly all of the LPNs working that shift. When Toothman inquired whether or not the other LPNs working the 3 to 11 shift were going to remain on that shift, Glenn replied that they were. The next day, however, the Home moved LPN Paula Beeson, who had been hired the previous summer and, consequently, had less seniority than Toothman, from the 3 to 11 to the 7 to 3 shift. 71 On February 11, Toothman photocopied ten resident care plans for study at home. These plans, kept in a binder located in one of the nursing facility's hallways, contain instructions pertaining to individual residents' dietary, hygienic, and therapeutic needs, and are used by nurses working the different shifts. The nurse in charge of the care plans had recently quit working for the Home, and Nursing Director Turpin, just before leaving the Home's employ herself, had instructed the LPNs how to complete the care plans in accordance with state requirements. As a result of her medical leave, Toothman had missed this training. Although her work had not yet required her to fill out a plan, Toothman decided that she should learn the proper way to write one. 72 Toothman's supervisor, RN Nora Smith, observed her photocopying the plans and asked what she was doing. Toothman testified that when she asked if she could take the plans home to study, Smith replied that it was all right with her. Toothman also stated that Smith told her she could purchase a book explaining how care plans should be written. Deciding that she did not need all ten plans, Toothman discarded eight of them before leaving the facility, and cut the residents' names off the remaining two. 73 The next day, Smith told Nursing Director Glenn that Toothman had copied the care plans. Glenn informed Bill Morgan, the Home's new Administrator, 21 and the two met with Toothman on February 14. Toothman admitted that she had copied the care plans and had taken two of them out of the facility. Morgan told Toothman that she had invaded the privacy of the Home's residents and discharged her. 74 The Board found that the Home violated Sec. 158(a)(1) and (3) by (i) failing to reinstate her to her former, or an equal, position of employment following her medical leave of absence, (ii) giving her a poor work evaluation, and (iii) ultimately discharging her. The Home challenges only the first and third findings. We conclude that substantial evidence supports both determinations. 75 The Home offers no explanation for its treatment of Toothman after her return from medical leave other than to resurrect the unavailing assertion that the Home had no seniority policy, an issue addressed earlier. The Home does not dispute that Toothman had previously taken medical leave and was fully reinstated, nor does it contend that she was told, in November, that by taking leave she would forfeit her seniority rights. Moreover, the employee handbook, which Nursing Director Glenn invoked as the source of the leave policy, supplies no justification for the Home's apparent departure from past practice; indeed, the handbook's provisions would appear to prohibit the action taken against Toothman. 22 The Board's conclusion that the Home failed to return Toothman to her former position for discriminatory reasons is supported by the evidence. 76 The Board found that the Home, by offering Toothman a position on the 3 to 11 shift after she returned from medical leave, discriminatorily failed to return her to a position that provided terms and conditions of employment similar to those she had previously enjoyed. In addition, the Board found that after Toothman had agreed to work on the evening shift the Home intentionally gave her a poor work evaluation in retaliation for her union activities. The Home's brief does not address Toothman's placement on the evening shift, and only mentions the substandard evaluation to say that she was not disciplined as a result of it. Because the Home does not challenge the Board's conclusions that these actions constituted yet more transgressions of the NLRA, those findings are summarily affirmed. NLRB v. Jakel Motors, Inc., 875 F.2d at 645. The uncontested violations do not disappear, however; [t]hey remain, lending their aroma to the context in which the [contested] issues are considered. NLRB v. Clark Manor Nursing Home Corporation, 671 F.2d 657, 660 (1st Cir.1982). 77 The Home does challenge the Board's finding that it unlawfully discharged Toothman. The Home argues that, by copying resident care plans for home study, Toothman removed medical records from the facility in violation of the faculty's anti-disclosure policies as well as state and federal regulations. The Home points out that, under the provisions of the employee handbook, the Home has the authority to discharge employees who take confidential records. 23 In defense of the Home's decision, Administrator Morgan testified before the ALJ that, during his forty years in the health care field, he had never worked in a facility that allowed nurses to make copies of health care plans and take them home. Morgan also stated that he would have fired Toothman for copying the plans even if she had not engaged in union activity. Toothman's supervisor, RN Nora Smith, testified that she never gave Toothman permission to photocopy the plans. Finally, the Home submits that Toothman implicitly acknowledged her misconduct because she originally protested to Glenn and Morgan only that discharge was too severe a penalty. 78 Toothman testified that she wanted the care plans for private study and had removed the names of residents from the two copies she took with her. The Board credited this testimony over that of the Home's witnesses, finding that no breach of resident confidentiality had, in fact, occurred. The Board noted that Toothman's supervisor, RN Smith, admitted that she did not know whether the Home had any policy prohibiting the photocopying of care plans. Moreover, both Smith and Glenn acknowledged that there could be no breach of confidentiality if a resident's name had been removed from a plan. Morgan admitted that, at the time he discharged Toothman, he had no knowledge that she had shared any information in the plans with others. 79 The Board may properly look to circumstantial evidence in determining whether a dismissal was illegally motivated. Livingston Pipe & Tube, Inc. v. NLRB, 987 F.2d 422, 426 (7th Cir.1993). This evidence can include the employer's knowledge of the discharged employee's union activity, whether or not the dismissal closely followed the commission of other unfair labor practices by the employer, and an implausible explanation for the discharge. Id.; NLRB v. Industrial Erectors, Inc., 712 F.2d at 1137. Once the general counsel establishes that the employer was motivated by antiunion sentiment, the employer will be held in violation of the Act unless it can show that the same decisions would have been made absent the employee's protected activity. J. Huizinga Cartage Company v. NLRB, 941 F.2d 616, 620 (7th Cir.1991). 80 The evidence supports the Board's finding that the Home's reason for discharging Toothman--that she had breached resident confidentiality--was a pretext for unlawful discrimination in violation of Sec. 158(a)(1) and (3). Toothman had a legitimate reason for photocopying the care plans, and no information concerning the Home's residents was disclosed to others. In light of this evidence, the Board could reasonably conclude that Toothman, who had previously been subjected to the Home's unfair labor practices, would not have been discharged absent her union activities. Rather, termination was the final step in a series of reprisals against an employee who had been an active union adherent from the start.