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What I’ve Been Reading This Week


With a short week after New Year’s and having to be in court three days this week, I unfortunately had little time to read through many articles.  With that being said, perhaps I should call this a labor law focused post, given the two labor law articles I highlighted below.  I point readers in particular to the article about a county in Delaware considering whether to approve a local right to work ordinance.  Something tells me we are likely to see another year ahead filled with right to work developments across the country, both at the statewide and local levels.

As always, below are a couple articles that caught my eye this week.


NLRB General Counsel Issues Memo Impacting Two Major Areas in Labor Law

Recently, the National Labor Relations Board Board General Counsel, Peter Robb, issued a memorandum that outlined several changes that will impact employers and employees alike.  The first major change deals with the NLRB’s deferral policy which allowed the deferral of unfair labor disputes to an agreed upon arbitrator (which promoted administrative efficiencies).  This policy had been ‘amended’ in 2012 to limit what matters could be deferred.  Robb’s memorandum will revert the deferral policy back to how it was originally construed before 2012 and make the deferral policy more broad.  The second major change outlined in Robb’s memorandum clarified that default language will no longer be required in an NLRB settlement agreement.  Prior to Robb’s memorandum, default language was required to be included in all NLRB settlement agreements that stipulated if the charged party (normally the employer) violated the agreement, then the charged party would consent to a default judgment against it in relation to the underlying labor allegations.  This is yet another example of the NLRB’s continued shift over the past year to more employer friendly policies.


Delaware County Delays Vote On Right to Work

Kevin Mooney at The Daily Signal noted earlier this week that the Sussex County Council has delayed a vote on a local right to work ordinance until at least January 9th to allow the county attorney to provide a formal opinion on the matter.  This delayed vote follows a public hearing in which union supporters apparently showed up in force to protest the possible right to work measure.  While Delaware allows local right to work ordinances (and another county in the state approved right to work legislation recently), Sussex County appears to be taking their time to decide on the matter.  My guess is this one will come down to the wire.

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