Opinion ID: 387150
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Solicitation by Employee James Cooke.

Text: 13 1. Anesthesia technician James Cooke testified that during the first week of July 1978, he was reading union literature to three other employees during his break time in a break room or lounge that was adjacent to the operating room. He was told by his supervisor, Ora Randall, that he was not supposed to have the literature in that area. According to Cooke, Randall stated that the room was not really a break room and that Cooke was not on a scheduled break. When Cooke continued to read the literature, Randall called him into her office and repeated that he was not on a scheduled break, that he was not supposed to have union literature in that particular room, and that he could be replaced for having the literature there. Randall testified that the area where Cooke was soliciting was not a lounge area, but rather part of the operating room. The ALJ, however, credited Cooke's testimony that the room was used by employees as a break room and that Cooke was in this break room at a time when he customarily took his break. The Board adopted the ALJ's conclusion that Randall prohibited Cooke from discussing unionism on his break time and threatened that he could be replaced for having union literature in the lounge area, both in violation of § 8(a)(1). 14 2. The general Board policy regarding solicitation in hospitals is that solicitation on nonwork time may be prohibited only where necessary to avoid disruption of patient care or disturbance of patients. NLRB v. Baptist Hospital, Inc., 442 U.S. 773, 99 S.Ct. 2598, 2603, 61 L.Ed.2d 251 (1979). Thus, proscriptions against solicitation in immediate patient-care areas are not regarded as presumptively invalid. Beth Israel Hospital v. NLRB, 437 U.S. 483, 98 S.Ct. 2463, 57 L.Ed.2d 370 (1978). But in areas other than immediate patient-care areas, such proscriptions are presumptively invalid; and if they are to be sustained it is incumbent upon the Hospital to show that disruption to patient care would necessarily result if solicitation and distribution were permitted in those areas. Id., at 495, 98 S.Ct. at 2470. In addition, we recognize that it is the Board's function to develop presumptions and its conclusions on such matters are traditionally accorded considerable deference. Baptist Hospital, supra, 99 S.Ct. at 2611 (Brennan, J. concurring). 15 In Baptist Hospital, the Court held that substantial evidence supported the Hospital's position that solicitation in corridors and sitting rooms on patients' floors tended to disrupt patient care and disturb patients, justifying a ban on solicitation in those areas: Small public rooms or sitting areas on the patient-care floors, as well as the corridors themselves, provide places for patients to visit with family and friends, as well as for doctors to confer with patients' families often during times of crisis. 99 S.Ct. at 2604-05. 16 In the instant case, the controversy turns on the characterization of the room in which Cooke was soliciting. The Hospital argues that the area in question was a sitting room on a patient-care floor and thus it was permissible for Randall to prohibit Cooke from soliciting there and to threaten that he could be replaced for so soliciting. 17 The room in question is adjacent to the operating room on the second floor of the Hospital. There are four doors in the room. One door opens onto the second floor's main corridor. Approximately twenty feet away from this main door, at the opposite end of the room, are two doors which lead respectively to the doctors' and nurses' dressing rooms. Also on this end of the room is a narrow hallway, approximately fifteen feet long. At the end of the hallway is the room's fourth door; this door leads to the outer portion of the operating room area where there are patients waiting to go into surgery. The dimensions of the room itself, not including the hallway that leads to the operating rooms, are approximately ten feet by twenty feet. No patients ever enter the area in question; it is never used as a passageway through which to transport patients to and from the operating room, nor is it ever used as a holding area for patients awaiting or recovering from surgery. Patient access to the operating room is through double doors that connect the operating room area directly to the main corridor. The room in question is furnished with a couch and two chairs. There is also a bulletin board on the wall. It was undisputed that employees regularly eat and drink in the room. Cooke testified that he has seen as many as fifteen people at one time in this room and that it is used as a lounge by thirty people from two different departments. But the ALJ rejected Randall's testimony that the room is part of the operating room (and thus an immediate patient care area), finding that 18 Although Ora Randall's testimony sought to establish the lounge area as a part of the operating room and thus not a permissible place to engage in union conversation the evidence overwhelmingly refutes her testimony. One doesn't regularly eat lunch, drink cokes and coffee, and engage in social conversation in an operating room. That these things were done in the lounge area where James Cooke was selling the Union's cause is undenied. 19 The Board agreed that the room is indeed a lounge; it noted that in fact there was once a sign on the door leading into the room designating it as the Doctor's Lounge. In addition, the Board indicated that the presence of a bulletin board in the room reinforced the conclusion that the room is a lounge for Hospital employees, 1 and therefore a permissible place to solicit support for the Union. Although the room is not generally accessible to visitors and patients, doctors occasionally confer with patients' relatives in the room. There is, however, a separate waiting room on the second floor for the use of visitors. Substantial evidence on the record supports the Board's conclusion that the area in question is neither part of the operating room, nor a public sitting room; it is a lounge for the use of hospital employees during their nonwork time. 20 Since the area where Cooke was soliciting is not an immediate patient care area, the burden rests on the Hospital to show that Randall's complete prohibition was necessary to prevent disruption of patient care. Beth Israel, supra, 437 U.S. at 495, 98 S.Ct. at 2470. Randall testified that before the incident with Cooke she was attending to a patient who was awaiting surgery in the operating room area the area that is connected to the lounge by the fifteen-foot long corridor. A nurse asked Randall if she had seen Cooke because some supplies for which he was responsible could not be located. Randall looked for Cooke in the anesthesia room, but he was not there so she located the supplies herself. She then found Cooke, who was on his break, in the lounge reading union literature to three other employees. According to the credited testimony of Cooke, Randall told him that he was not supposed to have union literature in the lounge. Cooke replied that he was on his break. Randall then returned to the operating room area where she had been before. She stated that she was aware of noise coming from the lounge. It was at this point that she returned to the lounge, told Cooke to come to her office, and then directed him to stop soliciting. This isolated incident is insufficient to show that disruption to patient care would necessarily result in the absence of a complete ban on solicitation in the lounge. Beth Israel, supra, 437 U.S. at 495, 98 S.Ct. at 2470. Randall failed to take the less restrictive approach of requesting that Cooke and the other employees talk more quietly. As the ALJ observed, It may very well be that this particular 'lounge' area is not well suited for a lounge area because of its proximity to the operating room. Nevertheless, it has been so used by the employees for at least the past year. Here, there is substantial evidence to support the Board's conclusion that the Hospital failed to overcome the presumption that solicitation in non-immediate patient care areas of the hospital does not disturb patient care or disturb patients. Cooke was soliciting on nonwork time in a nonwork area. While Randall claimed that she was disturbed by Cooke's solicitation, her response to the alleged disturbance was overbroad under the circumstances. The Board's order predicated on its finding that Supervisor Randall's prohibition violated § 8(a)(1) shall be enforced. 21