Bricklayers Central Michigan Administrative District Council

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Mar 30, 1995

316 N.L.R.B. 953 (N.L.R.B. 1995)

953
316 NLRB No. 143
BRICKLAYERS CENTRAL MICHIGAN ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT COUNCIL
1 The Respondent has excepted to some of the judge’s credibility
findings. The Board’s established policy is not to overrule an admin-
istrative law judge’s credibility resolutions unless the clear prepon-
derance of all the relevant evidence convinces us that they are incor-
rect. Standard Dry Wall Products, 91 NLRB 544 (1950), enfd. 188
F.2d 362 (3d Cir. 1951). We have carefully examined the record and
find no basis for reversing the findings.
In his decision, the judge quotes from a tape recording of a con-
versation between Charging Party Schrader and Local 31 Business
Agent Hollenback on April 14, 1992. As the judge inadvertently
misquoted Hollenback’s comments in his decision we correct the
quotation to conform to the tape. The quotation is amended to in-
clude an additional ‘‘I don’t know yet’’ after Hollenback’s initial
statement of ‘‘I don’t know yet’’ and to include ‘‘is’’ immediately
after ‘‘. . . you know, Elaine.’’
2 No exceptions were filed to the judge’s dismissal of allegations
against the Respondent International Union.
3 Unless otherwise noted, all subsequent dates are in 1991.
4 For example, Hollenback informed Schrader that
guaranteed, I will get rid of those Teamsters, they are going to
go. They can go easy or they can go tough. But go they’re
going to. The only thing left is what role you play. That’s the
only thing left. . . . Sue I’ve made you this terrific offer . . .
[and] if you take that to them, then that whole scenario is over.
International Union of Bricklayers and Allied
Craftsmen, AFL–CIO, and its Central Michi-
gan Administrative District Council and Ursula
Schrader. Case 7–CA–33506
March 30, 1995
DECISION AND ORDER
BY MEMBERS STEPHENS, COHEN, AND
TRUESDALE
On March 24, 1994, Administrative Law Judge Wil-
liam A. Pope II issued the attached decision. The Re-
spondent District Council filed exceptions and a sup-
porting brief. The General Counsel filed a brief in op-
position to the exceptions and the Respondent District
Council filed a reply brief to the General Counsel’s
opposition.
The National Labor Relations Board has delegated
its authority in this proceeding to a three-member
panel.
The Board has considered the decision and the
record in light of the exceptions and briefs and has de-
cided to affirm the judge’s rulings, findings,1 and con-
clusions,2 as modified, and to adopt the recommended
Order.
The judge found, and we agree, that the Respondent
District Council violated Section 8(a)(3) and (1) by re-
fusing to hire employee Schrader because of her union
affiliation. The Respondent excepts, inter alia, to the
judge’s failure to apply the Board’s analysis in Wright
Line, 251 NLRB 1083 (1980), enfd. 662 F.2d 899 (1st
Cir. 1981), cert. denied 455 U.S. 989 (1982), to the
present case. Although we agree with the Respondent
that Wright Line is applicable, we agree with the judge
that the Respondent has violated Section 8(a)(3) and
(1) for the reasons below.
Schrader began her employment as a secretary with
Bricklayers Local 31 in 1987 and joined Teamsters
Local 164 in 1990 at the insistence of her boss, Local
31 Business Agent Hollenback. In early 1991, officials
of 11 Bricklayers locals, including Local 31, began to
discuss the formation of a district council.
In August 1991,3 Schrader transferred her member-
ship to Teamsters Local 580. According to the credited
or undisputed evidence, Hollenback informed Schrader
several times in August and September that he was in-
tent on becoming the director of the district council,
that he wanted her to work for him at the council, and
that the International Union had selected them as a
team. Hollenback also told her, however, that he re-
sented her switching her membership to Teamsters
Local 580. He further informed Schrader that she
could work for him at the district council provided that
she end her affiliation with Teamsters Local 580.4
Schrader expressed her interest in the job and stated
that she was willing to end her affiliation with Local
580 provided she was covered by another contract.
However, such arrangements were never made.
On April 7, 1992, the International Union of Brick-
layers formally established the Central Michigan Ad-
ministrative District Council (the Council), and ordered
the 11 Bricklayers locals to affiliate with it. At the
same time, the International Union appointed
Hollenback as director of the Council. In a series of
meetings between April 7 and May 12, 1992, the man-
agement committee, appointed by Hollenback, and the
executive committee, appointed by the International
Union, discussed the Council’s operations. During
those meetings, Palazzolo, who had been the business
agent for Bricklayers Local 14, and was a member of
the executive and management committees and
Hollenback’s assistant, stated that his two secretaries
were covered by a collective-bargaining agreement
with a successorship clause and urged that the Council
hire them. The committee members did not question
Palazzolo’s assertion about the agreement nor did they
vote on the matter. At no time did Hollenback mention
Schrader or her interest in working for the Council.
Schrader had greater seniority than one of the Local 14
secretaries.
Hollenback testified that he excluded Schrader from
consideration for the secretarial job with the Council
because of her breach of his trust, which included
going behind his back and switching her membership
to Teamsters Local 580. No evidence was presented
showing that Hollenback harbored animosity toward
Schrader for any reason other than her transfer of
membership to Teamsters Local 580. Schrader was
permanently laid off in June 1992.
954 DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
5 According to Hollenback, however, the secretaries from Local 14
began performing work for the Council after April 7, 1992. The sec-
retaries were placed on the Council payroll in June 1992.
6 Pursuant to the District Council constitution adopted in May
1992, the council director has the authority to hire any office em-
ployees and to establish the terms and conditions of employment for
all such positions subject to approval by the executive committee.
1 The Respondents’ motion to dismiss the complaint at the conclu-
sion of the General Counsel’s case was denied by written order
dated May 10, 1993.
2 The District Council established by the IU on April 7, 1992, be-
came effective on April 30, 1992. The formation of the District
Council was part of an ongoing effort by the IU to streamline func-
tions of local unions, increase their operating efficiency, and enhance
their organizing and collective-bargaining activities. The IU’s con-
stitution gave it the authority to order local unions ‘‘to form, join
and remain affiliated with District Councils.’’ The IU official most
directly involved in the formation of the Central Michigan Adminis-
trative District Council was Thomas McClanahan, the IU’s director
of regionalization programs.
In Hollenback’s presence, Palazzolo informed the
business agent of the union representing the two sec-
retaries at Local 14 that the Council would honor its
agreement.5 Hollenback never reviewed the agreement
to determine whether the Council was in fact required
to adopt it or to hire both secretaries.6 Hollenback’s
animosity toward Schrader continued beyond the ter-
mination of her employment. During the summer of
1992, Palazzolo stated that he would not object to hir-
ing Schrader in addition to the two other secretaries
and would have no difficulty working with her.
Palazzolo testified that Hollenback’s reply was to the
effect that the Council would hire Schrader ‘‘over his
dead body.’’ Hollenback testified that he ‘‘wouldn’t
deny’’ making such a statement to Palazzolo.
Under Wright Line, the General Counsel has the
burden of making a prima facie showing sufficient to
support the inference that protected conduct was a
‘‘motivating factor’’ in the employer’s decision. We
find that the General Counsel has established a prima
facie case here. Hollenback was aware that Schrader
was interested in the job with the Council and offered
it to her on the condition that she end her affiliation
with Teamsters Local 580. Indeed, Hollenback admit-
ted that he had excluded Schrader from consideration
because she had gone behind his back and switched
her membership to a local of which he disapproved.
As the General Counsel has made a prima facie
showing, the Respondent District Council bears the
burden of demonstrating that Schrader would not have
been hired absent her protected conduct. We find that
the Respondent has not met that burden. In particular,
we find that the Respondent’s assertion that Schrader
would not have been hired because the Council was
contractually required to hire the two secretaries from
Local 14 is insufficient to rebut the General Counsel’s
strong prima facie showing. We note in particular that
Hollenback possessed the authority to hire the clerical
employees. He excluded Schrader from consideration
admittedly because of her protected conduct and made
no attempt to consider whether the contract required
the hiring of the two Local 14 secretaries.
The Respondent further asserts that Schrader would
not have been hired because she never applied for the
position. However, we find that Hollenback was fully
aware of her interest in the position, discussed their
going to work for the Council as a team, and explicitly
led her to believe that if he were hired she would be
hired as well, on the condition that she change her
union affiliation. Further, there is no evidence that ei-
ther of the two secretaries who were hired submitted
applications. In any event, we find that Schrader’s sub-
mission of an application would have been futile. In
this regard, we note that when his assistant suggested
that she be hired subsequent to the hiring of the two
Local 14 secretaries, Hollenback made it clear that he
would never consider her. Thus, we agree with the
judge that the Respondent District Council violated
Section 8(a)(3) and (1) by refusing to hire Schrader be-
cause of her union affiliation.
ORDER
The National Labor Relations Board adopts the rec-
ommended Order of the administrative law judge and
orders that the Respondent Central Michigan Adminis-
trative District Council, Ypsilanti, Michigan, its offi-
cers, agents, successors, and assigns, shall take the ac-
tion set forth in the Order.
Richard F. Czubaj, Esq., for the General Counsel.
Wilma B. Liebman, Esq., of Washington, D.C., for Respond-
ent International Union of Bricklayers and Allied Crafts-
men, AFL–CIO.
Christopher P. Legghio, Esq., of Detroit, Michigan, for Re-
spondent Central Michigan Administrative District Coun-
cil.
Randie K. Black, Esq., of Okemos, Michigan, for the Charg-
ing Party.
DECISION
WILLIAM A. POPE II, Administrative Law Judge. This case
was tried in Detroit, Michigan, between January 11 and May
13, 1993.1 The charge was filed on July 22, 1992, and the
complaint was issued September 9, 1992.
Background
On April 7, 1992, the executive board of the International
Union of Bricklayers (the IU), exercising authority granted to
it under the IU’s constitution, established a Central Michigan
Administrative District Council, effective April 30, 1992, to
be located in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and ordered that 11
Michigan local Bricklayers unions affiliate with it.2 Until the
creation of the District Council, the 11 Bricklayers local
unions operated independently from separate offices scattered
across the State of Michigan. Each local union employed a
business manager, and three of the local unions, Bricklayers
Local Union 12 (Flint, Michigan), Bricklayers Local Union
955BRICKLAYERS CENTRAL MICHIGAN ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT COUNCIL
3 Bricklayers Local Unions 12 and 31 each employed one sec-
retary; Local Union 14, the largest of the Bricklayers local unions,
employed two secretaries.
4 The position of executive director of the District Council was
hotly contested by Hollenback, Sam Palazzolo, business manager of
Bricklayers Local Union 14, and David Fraim, business manager of
Local Union 12. The selection of Hollenback to be the director was
recommended by Louis Weir, the IU’s executive vice president, and
was approved by the IU’s executive board.
5 All of the affiliated local unions were represented on the IU-ap-
pointed executive committee, except Local Union 21. Representa-
tives from nine of the affiliated local unions were appointed to be
the initial field representatives of the District Council.
6 The selection of the offices of Bricklayers Local Union 14 as the
site of the new District Council’s offices was made by the IU’s ex-
ecutive board on the recommendation of IU Vice President Weir. Se-
lection of Local Union 14’s offices for the District Council’s office
was said to have been based on factors such as that Local Union
14 had the largest suite of offices, and possessed a better computer
system than any of the other local unions. Another unstated factor
may have been to appease Local Union 14’s business manager, Sam
Palazzolo, who was a longtime labor union leader and had wanted
but was not selected to be the District Council’s first director. Local
Union 14 still retains an office adjacent to its former offices, now
occupied by the District Council.
14 (Ypsilanti, Michigan), and Bricklayers Local Union 31
(Lansing, Michigan), employed secretaries.3 The newly cre-
ated District Council took over all of the affiliated local
unions’ routine administrative functions, including dues col-
lection, recordkeeping, disbursements, fringe benefit adminis-
tration, and collective-bargaining and contract administration
and enforcement. The IU’s order also provides, however, that
each of the local unions will remain ‘‘intact as a politically
autonomous organization and will continue to conduct local
union meetings.’’
Exercising its authority to designate officers in newly
formed district councils for a period of up to 2 years, the
IU’s executive board appointed the business manager of
Bricklayers Local Union 31, Daryl Hollenback, to be the ini-
tial director of the District Council.4 The IU also appointed
the initial members of the District Council’s executive com-
mittee, and the initial 10 field representatives of the District
Council.5 The IU directed that the District Council’s offices
be established in the offices formerly occupied by Brick-
layers Local Union 14 in Ypsilanti, Michigan.6
After the District Council was formed, Director Hollen-
back appointed a management committee, which consisted of
Hollenback and five other members of the executive commit-
tee, including Sam Palazzolo, the former business manager
of Bricklayers Local Union 14. Hollenback also appointed
Palazzolo to be his administrative assistant.
The two secretaries employed by Bricklayers Local Union
14, Elaine Frye and Linda Ryznar, were transferred to the
District Council’s payroll in June 1992. While employed by
Local 14, they had been represented for collective-bargaining
purposes by Teamsters Local Union 164, which had a collec-
tive-bargaining agreement with Local 14. The collective-bar-
gaining agreement had a successor clause, and Teamsters
Local Union 164 continued to represent the two women after
they went to work for the District Council.
Ursula Schrader, the Charging Party, began working part
time for Bricklayers Local Union 31 as a secretary in July
1987, and became its full-time secretary, and only clerical
employee, in July 1989. Her supervisor was Local 31’s busi-
ness manager, Daryl Hollenback. Her employment by Local
31 was terminated when she was laid off in June 1992, after
Hollenback assumed his duties as director of the District
Council and the District Council took over the functions she
previously performed for Local 31.
In 1990, Schrader joined Teamsters Local Union 164 at
Daryl Hollenback’s insistence. Hollenback voluntarily recog-
nized the Union, and Hollenback negotiated a collective-bar-
gaining contract between Bricklayers Local Union 31 and
Teamsters Local Union 164 covering Schrader for the period
from January 1, 1990, through June 30, 1991. Sometime in
1991, Schrader transferred her union membership from
Teamsters Local Union 164 to Teamsters Local Union 580,
which was located nearer her home. The collective-bargain-
ing agreement between Bricklayers Local Union 31 and
Teamsters Local Union 164 was not renewed after it expired,
and Hollenback refused to voluntarily recognize or bargain
with Teamsters Local Union 580, which then represented
Schrader.
The constitution of the District Council, which was adopt-
ed at the District Council’s first convention on May 12,
1992, provides that the ‘‘Director shall hire office employees
for any positions he/she determines to be required for the ef-
ficient administration of the Central Michigan Administrative
District Council; he/she shall establish the terms and condi-
tions of employment for all such positions, subject to ap-
proval by the executive committee.’’
At issue in this case is the failure of the District Council
to hire Charging Party Ursula Schrader as one of its secretar-
ies. Respondent District Council does not dispute that
Schrader had more seniority, when seniority is measured by
the time she worked for a Bricklayers local union, than one
of the two secretaries hired by the District Council. Accord-
ing to Respondent District Council, at the time the charge in
this case was filed, Elaine Frye, one of the two secretaries
hired by the District Council, had 19 years’ seniority as an
employee of Local Union 14, and Linda Ryznar, the other
secretary hired by the District Council, had 4 years’ seniority
as an employee of Bricklayers Local Union 14. Charging
Party Schrader, who was not hired by the District Council,
had approximately 5 years’ seniority as an employee of
Bricklayers Local Union 31.
Issues
The complaint alleges that the Respondents violated Sec-
tion 8(a)(1) and (3) by Respondent International Union’s ap-
pointment of Daryl Hollenback as director of the Central
Michigan Administrative District Council, and by the dis-
criminatory failure of Respondent Central Michigan Admin-
istrative District Council, acting through its agent, Daryl
Hollenback, to offer the Charging Party a job at the District
Council in retaliation for her continued preference for Team-
sters Local 580 rather than Teamsters Local 164, thereby dis-
couraging membership in a labor organization.
In its answer to the complaint, Respondent IU denied that
it violated the Act as alleged in the complaint, but admitted
that both it and the District Council are labor organizations
and employers, within the meaning of the Act, and that the
District Council is affiliated with the IU. The IU also admit-
ted that the two Teamsters local unions are labor organiza-
tions within the meaning of the Act. The IU admitted that
Daryl Hollenback was the business manager of Local 31, and
956 DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
since mid-April 1992 has been the District Council director,
and that Thomas McClanahan was at all material times an
International vice president of the IU. The IU admitted that
it ordered the formation on April 7, 1992, of the District
Council with offices to be located in Ann Arbor, Michigan,
and appointed Daryl Hollenback to be the District Council’s
initial director.
In its answer to the complaint, Respondent District Coun-
cil also denied that it violated the Act, as alleged in the com-
plaint, but admitted that it is a labor organization within the
meaning of the Act, and that it is an affiliate of the IU. The
District Council admitted that both it and the IU are employ-
ers within the meaning of the Act, and that Daryl Hollenback
is the business manager of Local 31 and since mid-April
1992 is the District Council’s executive director. The District
Council also admitted that on April 7, 1992, the IU ordered
its formation with offices in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and ap-
pointed Daryl Hollenback as its initial director.
The General Counsel and the Charging Party argue that
the Respondents refused to hire the Charging Party as a sec-
retary for the District Council, because she challenged the
authority of Daryl Hollenback by selecting Teamsters Local
580 to represent her instead of Hollenback’s handpicked
Teamsters Local 164. The General Counsel asserts that Daryl
Hollenback as an admitted liar cannot be trusted to tell the
truth. According to the General Counsel and the Charging
Party, relations between the Charging Party and Hollenback,
her immediate supervisor, were good, until she transferred
her union membership from Teamsters Local 164 to Team-
sters Local 580, an action which angered Hollenback and
caused him to threaten her with more onerous working con-
ditions and even discharge. Hollenback told her that he want-
ed her as his secretary if he got the job as director of the
pending District Council, but only if she terminated her rela-
tionship with Teamsters Local 580. General Counsel and the
Charging Party contend that Hollenback had the sole author-
ity to hire secretaries for the District Council, and that he
made the decision to hire the two secretaries then employed
by Bricklayers Local Union 14, and to not hire the Charging
Party. They dispute that either the District Council’s execu-
tive committee or its management committee decided on who
to hire as secretaries. The General Counsel and the Charging
Party rely on tape recordings of conversations between the
Charging Party and Hollenback, made by the Charging Party
without Hollenback’s knowledge, to corroborate her testi-
mony. The IU’s liability, according to the General Counsel,
results from the fact that at the time the Charging Party was
not offered employment with the District Council, the Dis-
trict Council did not exist as its own entity, but operated
under the control of the IU, and acted as the IU’s agent.
The District Council contends that the General Counsel
has failed to meet its burden of proof in this case, because
no violation of the Act has been established; therefore, the
complaint should be dismissed. Respondent District Council
argues that the Charging Party never applied for a District
Council clerical job, and that, in any event, Daryl Hollenback
made no decision not to offer her a job with the District
Council and did not influence anyone else not to hire her.
According to Respondent District Council, the clerical hiring
decision was made by the management committee and the
executive committee of the District Council during its forma-
tive period. Sam Palazzolo, the former business manager of
Bricklayers Local 14, repeatedly urged the council and its
committees to hire Local 14’s two secretaries, stating that the
District Council was legally bound to do that by a successor
clause in the collective-bargaining agreement between Brick-
layers Local 14 and Teamsters Local 164, and even said that
if the District Council did not hire them it would be over his
dead body. According to Respondent District Council, the
management and executive committees ‘‘acquiesced, without
Mr. Hollenback’s control or influence, to Mr. Palazzolos un-
tested assertions.’’ Respondent District Council asserts that
while it is unclear when the decision was made to assume
Local 14’s contract with Teamsters Local 164, and no formal
vote was taken, it is absolutely clear that the management
and executive committees, and not Daryl Hollenback, de-
cided to assume Local 14’s clerical agreement by hiring
Local 14’s two secretaries as the secretaries for the District
Council. The possibility of hiring the Charging Party, Re-
spondent District Council points out, was never discussed by
either the executive or management committees. Moreover,
argues the District Council, Daryl Hollenback did not abdi-
cate his authority to hire the District Council’s clerical staff,
because the extent of his authority was not clear during the
District Council’s planning meetings before the May conven-
tion which ratified its constitution. Finally, Respondent Dis-
trict Council argues that the tape recordings made by the
Charging Party do not establish that he made any decision
not to hire her out of union animus; at best they show no
more than an earlier 8(a)(3) violation by Local Union 31.
Hollenback was not legally obligated to submit the Charging
Party’s name for consideration for a District Council clerical
job, and all proofs point to the fact that he never even
thought about her during deliberations to hire the District
Council’s clerical staff.
The International Union contends that the idea of forming
an Administrative District Council in Central Michigan origi-
nated with the local unions, whose officers met with Thomas
McClanahan, the IU’s director of regionalization programs,
in late 1991 and early 1992 to discuss the concept.
McClanahan’s role was to guide the local unions in structur-
ing their District Council. On April 7, 1992, the executive
board of the IU established a Central Michigan Administra-
tive District Council, and the executive board also exercised
its authority to designate officers in the newly formed Dis-
trict Council for a period of 2 years. The IU argues that the
choice of Daryl Hollenback to be the director of the District
Council was recommended by IU Executive Vice President
Louis Weir, who was unaware of any problems between
Hollenback and Charging Party Schrader. The IU states that
the employment of office secretaries by the District Council
was strictly a matter of District Council business in which
the IU played no role. The IU contends that neither
McClanahan nor anyone else from the IU participated in dis-
cussions concerning the hiring of the District Council’s sec-
retaries, or took any position with respect to Charging Party
Schrader. McClanahan’s only involvement with Schrader was
in the fall of 1991, when he learned of an NLRB case, based
on a charge by Schrader, against Local 31, involving dis-
criminatory reduction in her hours at Local 31 because of her
Teamsters union membership. McClanahan determined that a
default judgment had been entered against Local 31, and he
thought the case had nothing to do with the formation of the
District Council. The IU further contends that McClanahan
957BRICKLAYERS CENTRAL MICHIGAN ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT COUNCIL
had not previously run into the situation in which office em-
ployees of a Bricklayers Local Union belonged to a different
union, and when he pointed out to Hollenback that the cleri-
cal staff of Bricklayers affiliates could join the Bricklayers
Union, Hollenback asked him to talk to Schrader about it.
According to the IU, McClanahan did talk with Schrader
about joining the Bricklayers Union, and thought that she
seemed receptive, and that would solve the problem. The IU
states that McClanahan did not hear anything further from
Schrader, and did not know that she had not been hired as
a secretary for the District Council, until June 1992, when
she called him and said she had been laid off by Hollenback.
The IU concludes that the officers and employees of the Dis-
trict Council are not officers, employees, or representatives
of the IU, and have no authority to act on behalf of or bind
the IU. The IU seeks dismissal of the charges against it, be-
cause there is no evidence of retaliatory motive or conduct
on the part of the IU against Schrader, the IU has no vicari-
ous liability for the acts of its affiliated District Council, and
it did not participate in or ratify any unlawful conduct
against Schrader by the District Council. The IU also argues
that it has no legal duty to correct any alleged unlawful acts
of its affiliated District Council.
I.
Ursula Schrader started as a part-time employee of Local
31 in June 1987, working 20 hours a week, and then in July
1989 she was made its full-time secretary and office em-
ployee. She was laid off by Local 31 on June 4, 1992.
Her duties as secretary with Bricklayers Local 31 were to
answer the telephone, do typing and filing, and receive and
deposit members’ dues. Her immediate supervisor was Daryl
Hollenback, who was the business manager of Local 31. In
June 1990, at Hollenback’s insistence, she joined Teamsters
Local 164, located in Jackson, Michigan, a one-half hour
drive from her home in Lansing, Michigan. Hollenback ex-
plained that it was necessary for her to be covered by a pen-
sion plan, and he wanted her to affiliate with Teamsters
Local 164, and not the Teamsters local union in Lansing,
Michigan, where Schrader lives. Schrader said that her
choice was either to join Teamsters Local 164, or give up
her job. Hollenback negotiated a collective-bargaining agree-
ment with Dennis Hands, the business agent of Teamsters
Local 164, covering Schrader as an employee of Bricklayers
Local Union 31.
Schrader stated that she had asked Hollenback why she
could not be in the Bricklayers Union, and that she told
Hollenback at the outset that she would rather join Teamsters
Local 580, located in Lansing, Michigan, where she lives.
Later, when she told Hollenback she would like to transfer
to Teamsters Local 580, Hollenback told her that he would
get rid of her if she did. She said that Hollenback repeated
the threat when he received letters from Teamsters Local 580
and Teamsters Local 164 about her transfer to Local 580.
She said that she signed a transfer slip transferring her mem-
bership to Local 580 in August 1991, and after that
Hollenback told her that he did not trust her anymore be-
cause she had gone behind his back and joined Teamsters
Local 580. Hollenback said that he was told by Tom
McClanahan, a representative of the International Union, to
get the situation straightened out or get rid of her.
In August 1991, Schrader spoke with McClanahan by tele-
phone. She said that McClanahan told her that Daryl
Hollenback was under consideration for the position of direc-
tor of the District Council. She said that she felt from the
conversation, however, that Hollenback had been selected for
the position. McClanahan told her that he had heard from
Daryl Hollenback that there were some problems between
her and Hollenback, and he said he told Hollenback to
straighten them out because she was one reason the Inter-
national Union had picked Hollenback to head the District
Council. He said that he wanted Hollenback and Schrader to
come as a team. She said that McClanahan asked her how
she had gotten into the Teamsters in the first place, and why
Hollenback had not put her in the Bricklayers Union. She
told him that was what she had wanted, and she had asked
Hollenback why she could not be in the Bricklayers Union.
McClanahan told her that if she dropped her membership in
Teamsters Local 580, she could be put under contract with
the Bricklayers. She told him that Teamsters Local 580 was
willing to let her go if she had a good contract with the
Bricklayers.
Schrader stated that she recalled a conversation with
Hollenback on September 18, 1991, in which he told her that
he had heard that it was definite that the International Union
was going to form a district council in Michigan, and he said
they were both up for jobs. He told her that she was not to
repeat to anyone else anything he said. He said that
McClanahan had told him that one reason he had been
picked to head the District Council was that they came as
a matched set. He asked her if she wanted to stay with Local
580 or take the job in Ypsilanti with the District Council.
She told Hollenback that she wanted the job in Ypsilanti, and
she would do whatever she could to get the problem with
Local 580 resolved. On September 18, however, Teamsters
Local 580 filed a grievance on her behalf protesting against
Bricklayers Local 31 cutting her hours of work.
The next day, September 19, 1991, Hollenback said he had
spoken with Tom McClanahan, and had told him that he
thought he could get the problem with Schrader worked out.
He told her that they had been selected as a team, and if she
cooperated she had no place to go but up; if she did not co-
operate she would be out. Schrader said she told Hollenback
she would talk to Teamsters Local 580. Hollenback told her
she would have to get rid of Teamsters Local 580 because
the International Bricklayers Union did not want the Team-
sters to be part of the Bricklayers organization. He said that
Schrader had a choice, she could either have the job with the
District Council or stay with Teamsters Local 580, and she
would be out. Schrader said that the next day, September 20,
1991, Hollenback told her that his attorney, Christopher
Legghio had told him there were other ways to get rid of
Teamsters Local 580, and not to trust her. Hollenback said
that Legghio, had told him she might have a tape recorder
so not to talk to her.
Schrader stated that the first official notice she had that
Hollenback would be the director of the District Council was
in an April 7, 1992 letter. The letter also said that the Dis-
trict Council would be located in Ypsilanti, Michigan. Until
shortly before that, she had thought that it would in Lansing,
Michigan. She stated that she had heard a lot of discussion
about who would be the director, and that Hollenback had
told her that Dave Fraim, the business agent of Bricklayers
958 DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Local 12, wanted the job. Sam Palazzolo, the business agent
of Bricklayers Local 14 had told her that he, too, wanted the
appointment. She stated that she did not ask Palazzolo to
consider her for a position with the District Council, al-
though he had asked her if she would be his secretary, and
she had agreed she would.
Schrader admitted that she did not fill out an application
for a job at the District Council. She agreed that Daryl
Hollenback did not offer her a job with the District Council
after April 7, 1992. She said that no one on the executive
committee of the District Council told her that she had been
considered as a possible employee of the District Council.
She said that in May 1992, however, Daryl Hollenback said
that the team players would be at the District Council. He
said he could hire and fire whoever he wanted.
Schrader gave three reasons why she felt she should have
been considered for a job with the District Council; first, her
conversation with Thomas McClanahan in 1991; second,
conversations with Hollenback in 1991; and, third, because
of clauses in her contract (apparently referring to clauses in
the collective-bargaining agreement covering her between
Teamsters Local 164 and Bricklayers Local 31). She agreed
that after September 1991, Hollenback gave her ‘‘the silent
treatment’’ most of the time. She agreed that Hollenback did
not offer her a job with the District Council in February
1992, or on April 13 or 14, 1992. She further agreed that the
most recent time Hollenback promised her a job with the
District Council was in September 1991, 7 months before he
was appointed to be the director. She said that she still
thought that she had a job with the District Council in April
1992. She admitted that Hollenback did not ask her in April
1992 if she was still interested in a job with the District
Council. She said that she had told Hollenback toward the
end of 1991 or the first of 1992 that she wanted a job with
the District Council wherever it was located.
II.
The warning allegedly given to Hollenback that Schrader
might be tape recording their conversations turned out to be
prophetic. As it turns out, Schrader made at least six tape re-
cordings of her conversations with Hollenback starting in
August 1991, and ending in 1992. She used a hidden voice
activated tape recorder which she carried to her office in her
pocket. The tape recordings of her conversations with
Hollenback which were admitted into evidence were made
during the first week of August 1991, on September 16, 18,
and 19, 1991, on February 17, 1992, and on April 14, 1992.
In conversations which Schrader recorded during the pe-
riod from August 1991 to April 1992, Daryl Hollenback,
who was then the business agent of Bricklayers Local Union
31, repeatedly expressed his intention to obtain the appoint-
ment as the first director of the planned District Council, and
his determination not to let anything stand in his way in get-
ting the job. In his own words:
I want to tell you Sue, I want to tell the god’s honest
truth, I am going to get that directorship, I am going
to get it.
Later, Hollenback was even more explicit in stating he would
not let his problems with Schrader stand in his way of get-
ting the job:
I’m just trying to tell you that I’m not without options.
All that was going on here, even though [?] I get mad,
I say things and do things, ok, but I don’t wish you any
ill will. I fully intend to be that director, I fully intend
to have that happen. Any problems that I got that, that
is going [to] jeopardize that position, I must cure. I
want to put all this behind us, and I’m going to get all
my ducks in a row in a position so that when all this
falls into place, I’m setting right there in the god damn
cat bird seat, just the way we been scheming to do for
the last four years.
Hollenback unequivocally told Schrader that he would get
her a job with the District Council, on two conditions. First,
that he got the job of the director of the District Council, and
second that she terminate her membership and involvement
with Teamsters Local 580. In Hollenback’s words:
If we can ever pull off this god-damn union regional-
ization thing and if I get the job, there’s a damn good
job in that for you. But, but that’s no promise and I
don’t know if I can pull it off. I worked three years on
it now and it ain’t happened but, but it looks to me like
it gets closer all the time. I’m hoping that’s what’s [in-
audible]. But this is all up to you, because I can also
tell you something, I ain’t having somebody working
for me that sneaks around behind my back, that ain’t
gonna happen.
That reference, and numerous others like it, in context,
clearly referred to his displeasure with Schrader’s involve-
ment with Teamsters Local 580, and his resentment over
what he perceived to be attempts by Teamsters Local 580 of-
ficials to interfere in the affairs of Bricklayers Local 31. Re-
ferring to demands apparently made by Teamsters Local 580
for a salary increase for Schrader, Hollenback told her that
‘‘I’m tired of it and it’s going to god-damn stop.’’ He told
Schrader that meant ‘‘I won’t sign no god-damn agreement
with anybody.’’ In a later conversation, Hollenback, in an
apparent reference to Teamsters Local 580, said:
But I’m also going to tell you, I fully thoroughly resent
that third party, I thoroughly resent that. Now that’s
where most of my negative reactions have been coming
from.
Not only did Hollenback make it clear to Schrader that he
would never voluntarily recognize Teamsters Local 580 as
her collective-bargaining agent, or enter into a collective-bar-
gaining agreement with it, he repeatedly attempted to induce
her to sever her relationship with Teamsters Local 580 by
falsely stating that the International Union of Bricklayers
would not accept her involvement with Teamsters Local 580.
On one occasion he told Schrader that ‘‘The IU has certain
things that they absolutely require. They absolutely require.
I’ll tell you, the Teamsters ain’t part of it.’’ Hollenback went
on to say on the same occasion concerning the District Coun-
cil and the Bricklayers International Union that:
But I’m going to tell the god’s honest truth, Sue, I
want you with me. I don’t know anybody that knows
that computer as well as you do, but I’m going to tell
something else just as true. If I can’t [inaudible] I
959BRICKLAYERS CENTRAL MICHIGAN ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT COUNCIL
won’t have those Teamsters with me. We can’t have an
agreement with them, we can’t, that’s period. I was told
that. So if, I can’t have you, then, then I just won’t.
[Inaudible.]
. . . .
What they suggested was is that you join the brick-
layers, a separate contract be drawn for you. That we
pay into the IU as of right now. [Inaudible.] We’ve got
to get you into that secretary position. They want me
to go to, I got to go down south to a meeting here. [In-
audible] We got to [inaudible]. So we’re 99% there
now and I mean there you and me and [inaudible].
We’re going to take a hit in our dues [inaudible]. If
there’s any way to do it, try to get her in, into that
health insurance plan that you guys have going. Try to
get her in that thing. Look [inaudible] but if she’s
against you, if she’s working at logger heads with you,
you get rid of her and you get rid of her now because
she can kill you. That’s their words. Now you and I
both know that, we have had [inaudible] before and I
don’t plan on being killed. So the decisions are all
yours.
Hollenback specifically referred to Thomas McClanahan,
the International Union’s director of regionalization projects,
in the following statement that he made to Schrader:
You know Tom McClanahan, I talked to Tom today
too, you know what Tom said? I run some of this stuff
by him first. Tom said look, he said I’ve met your sec-
retary a couple of times, ah. He said have things gone
beyond where you two absolutely can’t work together
because I was quite impressed; I thought that she could
handle the other girls that would have to work under
her. I said, Tom, you know she can and she could, but
I got a hell of a mess with the Teamsters, just can’t
have that, can’t have that. He said some political advise
[sic], some political advise [sic] to you, whatever mess
you got in your office, you straighten it out, you
straighten it out with her or you straighten it out with-
out her, but you straighten it out. That’s my options. I
mean that’s my options. I’m between a rock and a hard
place too, I got them telling me one thing, and I got
these two jokers jerking me around here.
Hollenback told Schrader that he would not get the director-
ship of the District Council if he signed an agreement with
Teamsters Local Union 580.
The second I sign it, I don’t get the directorship, within
a years’ time, you and I both lose [our] jobs. Because
the International Union absolutely will not have the
Teamsters within their organization, because the Team-
sters are the kiss of god damn death to any union. The
government is after the Teamsters constantly. And
that’s spinning out your way. I know it’s a hell of a
load on your shoulders but you know what the hell to
do.
Hollenback continued to dangle the prospect of a job with
District Council before Schrader, but only if she cooperated
by terminating her involvement with Teamsters Local 580:
So you see now the position that I’m into. So one thing
I will accomplish, that is guaranteed, I will get rid of
those Teamsters, they are going to go. They can go
easy or they can go tough. But go they’re going to. The
only thing that is left is, what role you play. That’s the
only thing left. I can’t tell you what to do. I can’t, I
can’t say here I, Sue I’ve made you this terrific offer,
so on and so forth, and then, because if you take that
to them, then that whole scenario is over. I can’t offer
that job [inaudible]. You won’t get it, it won’t happen.
Then you know what I did is, then I’d get the tough
fight with the Teamsters, guaranteed.
. . . .
But, you know, there’s just a lot of ways you can
spin this god damn out, it may come down to where
I don’t get the job, but you might well get your portion
of it. I mean, that’s a picture to paint too. Now where,
what helps both of us is when we go as a matched set.
I mean I want that better paying job. I want the oppor-
tunity because some day I want to work right directly
for the IU. That’s what I want. And this is a step to
help me get there. And I want that better paying job be-
cause I want that position because I think I, I think I
can do some stuff with this damn state. You have an
opportunity to have a shot at that, that next level too.
You just have to decide how you are going to play it.
These are all political questions. And I’ll tell you, its
like any politics, sometimes you lose.
. . . .
So you and I have either got to get, we either have
to be on each others [sic] side and that’s the best. You
have to look out for me and I have to look out for you,
and we got to start pushing on this thing even more
than we have done, so that when it is tossed, we get
it as a matched set. That’s the best way.
In a recorded conversation on April 14, 1992, Schrader
asked Hollenback who the other secretary for the District
Council would be, and received the following evasive an-
swer:
SCHRADER: Here’s that letter. So Elaine is going to
be one of the secretaries down there [one of the District
Council’s secretaries]. Who’s going to be the other
one?
MR. HOLLENBACK: I don’t know yet. They’ve got
a—I won’t know for sure until after all this stuff is put
together because even though if business agents, myself
and the executive committee has been appointed noth-
ing is official.
It’s official but there is no entity there and there is
no district council and there won’t be until it’s offi-
cially acted on, the 12th I believe it will be.
So where it’s all going to take I have got to go in
and find out what kind of an agreement they have got
with the Teamsters and if there is a successor clause
there, all that kind of stuff. Just a myriad of details, just
a myriad of details. But because its going to Ann
Arbor, you know, Elaine—
SCHRADER: Yes, she has been saying that right
along.
960 DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
MR. HOLLENBACK: Yes. Well, of course Sam [Sam
Palazzolo, business agent of Local 14] has been saying
a lot of stuff right along that wasn’t true and the issue
got blurred for a lot of different people.
III.
On April 7, 1992, Daryl Hollenback was appointed by the
IU’s executive committee to be the director of the Central
Michigan Administrative District Council and chairman of its
executive committee. The initial members of the executive
committee were appointed by the IU, but Hollenback ap-
pointed the members of the management committee, who
serve at his pleasure, and as the director he supervises the
day-to-day activities of the field agents. The constitution of
the District Council, adopted at the District Council’s first
convention on May 12, 1992, gives the director the authority
to hire office employees, as he determines are needed, and
gives him the authority to establish the terms and conditions
of employment for such positions, subject to approval by the
executive committee.
In testimony given on March 8, 1993, Hollenback an-
swered, ‘‘I may have,’’ to the question, ‘‘Did you ever tell
Schrader that the two of you worked well together and if you
became the Director, you would want her working with
you?’’ He admitted that he never considered her for a sec-
retarial job with the District Council, after he was appointed
to the job of director of the District Council. He said that
by then she had accused him of legal improprieties with
money and he did not know how he could work with a per-
son like that. He also said that he did not raise her name
with the executive committee as a candidate for a secretarial
job.
The parties entered into a stipulation that on November 12,
1991, the Michigan Employment Relations Commission
issued a decision in which it refused to conduct an election
for a single-employee unit at Local 31, in response to a peti-
tion filed by Teamsters Local 580 on behalf of Sue (Ursula)
Schrader. The parties further stipulated that an earlier petition
for an election was also filed with and rejected by the
NLRB, and that Teamsters Local 580 never had a collective-
bargaining agreement with Bricklayers Local 31.
Hollenback admitted in his testimony that he ‘‘didn’t like
those people at 580,’’ then or now. He also said that he was
upset when he learned in August 1991 that Schrader had
transferred her union membership to Teamsters Local 580.
He said that he thought she should have come to him first.
He admitted that he may have told her that he would never
enter into a union agreement with Teamsters Local 580. He
admitted that he lied when he told Schrader that he had been
told that he could not have an agreement with Teamsters
Local 580. He admitted that ‘‘nobody told me anything.’’
Hollenback said that he discussed his problems with
Schrader with Thomas McClanahan, ‘‘Only in a very general
sense.’’ He admitted that he had not discussed the problem
with the Teamsters specifically with McClanahan. Hollen-
back acknowledged that he told Schrader that he had told
Thomas McClanahan that he had ‘‘a hell of a mess with
Teamsters,’’ and that he could not have that. He also admit-
ted that he had never said that to Thomas McClanahan. He
admitted that he was willing to take ‘‘certain liberties’’ and
to lie to get the problem resolved.
Hollenback acknowledged that he told Schrader that
McClanahan had said ‘‘you straighten it out with her or you
straighten it out without her, but you straighten it out. So
that’s my options.’’ He admitted that Thomas McClanahan
had not made those statements to him.
Hollenback said that he wanted the director’s job, and that
he viewed the problem he had in his office, referring to
Schrader and her relationship with Teamsters Local 580, as
a threat to his getting the position. When he told Schrader
that she was part of a package, he meant that she would go
with him. He admitted that at that time, September 1991, he
would have taken Schrader with him to the District Council,
but that the problem with the Teamsters had to go. He said
that by April 20, 1992, however, he was no longer sure that
Schrader wanted a job at the District Council, because by
then their relationship had turned into a strictly business rela-
tionship, and she had not expressed any desire to go to work
for the District Council. He also said that he did not recall
that she had said anything indicating that she did not want
a job at the District Council.
Hollenback acknowledged that the District Council as-
sumed a collective-bargaining agreement with Teamsters
Local 164 covering the two clerical employees formerly em-
ployed by Bricklayers Local Union 14 who now work for the
District Council. Hollenback stated he was present when Sam
Palazzolo spoke by telephone to Dennis Hands, the business
agent for Teamsters Local Union 164, and told Hands that
the District Council would honor the agreement between
Teamsters Local Union 164 and Bricklayers Local Union 14,
covering the two clerical employees (Linda and Elaine) of
Local 14 who became clerical employees of the District
Council.
Hollenback stated that the contract he had negotiated with
Dennis Hands, of Teamsters Local Union 164, covering
Schrader, expired in June 1991. He stated that he did not ne-
gotiate a replacement agreement with Teamsters Local Union
164, or a new agreement with Teamsters Local Union 580.
Sometime in the fall of 1991, as part of his lobbying effort
to obtain the job of director of the District Council,
Hollenback visited Thomas McClanahan at the latter’s office
in Indiana. He admitted that he did not discuss Schrader with
McClanahan during that meeting. He said that his conversa-
tion with McClanahan concerned how the District Council
would work. Hollenback said that he received no indication
from McClanahan during that meeting that he would be se-
lected to be director of the District Council when it was
formed. He also said that McClanahan did not indicate at
that time where the District Council would be located.
Hollenback said that he assumed at the time that the District
Council would be located in Lansing, Michigan.
Hollenback denied that he made the decision not to offer
Schrader a job at the District Council’s office, or that he
made the decision to hire the two secretaries employed by
Local 14 as the secretaries of the District Council. He admit-
ted, however, that he made the decision not to hire a third
secretary for the District Council. He said the District Coun-
cil could not afford it, and there was no need for a third sec-
retary.
Hollenback said that the District Council’s management
committee, composed of himself, Sam Palazzolo, David
Frame, David Blake, and Larry Spoffitt met several times be-
tween April 7 and 20, 1992, and discussed matters such as
961BRICKLAYERS CENTRAL MICHIGAN ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT COUNCIL
7 Dennis Hands, the president and agent of Teamsters Local 164
testified that he received a telephone call from Sam Palazzolo, who
said, ‘‘Dennis, we’re going to a District Council. We’re not going
to have any problems with the contract. It will stay in place. The
gals will keep their seniority. We will keep everything the way it
is.’’ Hands said that Palazzolo did not say where he got the authority
to make that commitment. He said also that he did not have any dis-
cussion with Hollenback about who would be the secretaries for the
District Council.
8 Hollenback said that Hazel King, the wife of the business man-
ager of Bricklayers Local Union, had expressed an interest in em-
ployment at the District Council, but her name did not come up dur-
ing meetings of the management committee.
9 He also denied that anyone from the IU had told him he had the
authority to offer Schrader a job at the District Council in 1991.
the dues structure for journeymen and apprentices, and the
wages the field representatives of the District Council would
receive. Hollenback said that during some or all of these
meetings, Sam Palazzolo raised the issue that Bricklayers
Local Union 14’s contract with the Teamsters Local Union
164 had a successor clause in it.7 Hollenback denied that he
said at any meeting of the management committee that he
wanted Local 14’s contract with the Teamsters to be assumed
by the District Council. He said that the District Council’s
executive committee on its own decided to assume the con-
tract with Teamsters Local 164 at its April 20, 1992 meeting.
Hollenback said that Schrader’s name never came up as a
candidate for a job at the District Council during manage-
ment committee meetings.8 He denied that because of her af-
filiation with Teamsters Local Union 580 he did not bring
up Schrader as someone interested in a secretarial job at the
District Council, and he denied any recollection that he told
Sam Palazzolo that if Schrader was hired it would be over
his dead body. He admitted that he would not hire Schrader,
but said that was because he did not trust her anymore after
she had accused him of some ‘‘serious things.’’
Hollenback denied that he knew that Schrader was inter-
ested in a job at the District Council in Ypsilanti in April
1992. He denied that he was silent and inactive in selecting
who to hire for clerical positions at the District Council, and
he denied that he intended to prevent the hiring of Schrader
by being silent or inactive. He said that although he now
knows that under the District Council’s constitution he has
the authority to hire clerical employees, he had not read the
constitution in detail in April 1992.9 He said that ‘‘Sam
Palazzolo had made his proposals about the Local 14 sec-
retaries on countless occasions. And it all just seemed to
flow together.’’ Hollenback testified that he did not believe
that Elaine Frye or Linda Ryznar ever applied for their posi-
tions at the District Council.
Hollenback said that Sam Palazzolo brought up hiring the
secretaries for Local 14 as the secretaries for the District
Council at meetings between April 7, 1992, and the May
1992 District Council convention. He said he did not bring
up hiring Schrader, nor did he indicate who the District
Council should hire. He said no one disagreed with
Palazzolo, when he said that Local 14 had a contract with
Teamsters Local 164 covering its clerical employees, and
that the contract had a successor clause in it. After April 7,
1992, the two Local 14 secretaries did the clerical work for
the District Council, without any ‘‘grand announcement.’’ He
said that no one on the District Council’s executive commit-
tee or management committee objected to assuming Local
14’s contract. Hollenback said that he did not disagree with
Palazzolo, even though he had not looked at Local 14’s con-
tract, and he said that he did not do anything to avoid hiring
Schrader. Hollenback said that he did not tell the executive
committee or the management committee that either of them
could make the decision on who to hire as clerical employees
for the District Council. He said that he did not believe that
a formal vote on the clerical employees was taken at either
an executive committee or management committee meeting.
In response to a question asking when it was decided to
assume the contract with Teamsters Local 164 covering the
two secretaries employed by Bricklayers Local 14, Hollen-
back said, ‘‘It was brought up in a number of different meet-
ings. It was just a part of other actions that we were taking
. . . At that point in time, it was just a small—it was just
a minor issue to deal with.’’ Hollenback also admitted that
as of the time of his testimony on May 12, 1993, he still had
not looked at Bricklayers Local Union 14’s contract to see
if it has a successor clause, although he had told Schrader
that he would. He denied that a decision had been made by
April 14, 1992, to hire Elaine Frye as a secretary for the Dis-
trict Council.
Hollenback denied that he had ever promised Schrader a
job with the District Council in the Ann Arbor-Ypsilanti area
between June 1991 and June 1992. He said he did not have
the authority to make such a promise. He said he did not re-
call telling her that he would transfer her. He said that he
did not remember saying that he was going to take Schrader
to the District Council, but he acknowledged that on different
occasions he said that he would like to have her with him.
Hollenback said that he was sure that Sam Palazzolo at
some point in time told the two secretaries employed by
Bricklayers Local Union 14 that they would be the secretar-
ies for the District Council. He said he did not recall telling
that to them, nor did he authorize Palazzolo to tell them that
they were now employees of the District Council. He said
that either he told the secretaries to put themselves on the
District Council’s payroll, which they prepared, or Sam
Palazzolo did. He said that the two secretaries sit where they
sat when they worked for Local 14, working at the same
desks, typewriters, and computers, and they receive the same
pay and benefits.
IV.
Louis Weir, the executive vice president of the Bricklayers
International Union, testified that the local unions are autono-
mous in many respects: they negotiate their own collective-
bargaining agreements, collect their dues, elect their officers,
organize their members, call strikes, define offenses, and im-
pose penalties for those offenses. He said that the IU has no
right to the funds and assets of the local unions, and does
not control or interfere with the internal operations of the
local unions.
Weir said that the Central Michigan Administrative Dis-
trict Council was established by order of the IU executive
board, which also appointed the first director of the District
Council and the members of its executive committee to serve
for a period of 2 years. After that the director and the execu-
tive committee will be elected at special conventions of the
constituent local unions. Weir said that he recommended that
Daryl Hollenback be appointed as the first director of the
District Council, and his recommendation was approved by
962 DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
10 Schrader testified that McClanahan’s testimony was essentially
correct. She said that at one point he said, ‘‘Don’t worry. You’re
not going to be fired.’’ She said she explained a money incident
which had occurred and said that was the reason she did not trust
Hollenback any more. She said that she was not opposed to joining
the Bricklayers Union, and would have dropped her membership in
the IU’s executive board. He said that he recommended
Hollenback because he knew him to be a good local union
officer, who participated in the affairs of the Bricklayers
Union. Weir said that he recommended that the District
Council be located in Ypsilanti, Michigan, because he
‘‘wanted to throw a bone’’ to Sam Palazzolo, and also be-
cause Local 14 was the largest local union in Michigan, and
had the equipment and office staff to do the administrative
work.
Weir said he did not know Schrader, and was not really
aware of any problem that Hollenback had with her. He said
that Hollenback may have said something vague about hav-
ing a problem with his secretary, but nothing specific.
Hollenback said nothing about Teamsters Local 580, and
Weir said that he did not know anything about Teamsters
Local 580 at the time. He said that Thomas McClanahan had
not reported anything about a problem between Schrader and
Hollenback. Weir said he did not participate in any discus-
sion about who would be hired by the District Council as its
office staff, and it is not a function of the IU to appoint the
office staff of a newly created district council. He said he
was unaware of discussions Hollenback may have had with
Schrader about a secretarial position with the District Coun-
cil, or hostility by Hollenback toward Schrader or Teamsters
Local 580.
Weir testified that a district council cannot remove a local
officer pending an appeal to the International Union. He said
that the IU can override the constitution of an affiliate (local
union or district council) if that constitution is not in con-
formity with the IU’s constitution. He said that when the IU
forms a district council, it also approves the constitution of
the district council.
Thomas McClanahan testified that he first learned that
Schrader had not been hired as a secretary by the District
Council when she called him on June 4, 1992, and said she
had been laid off by Local 31. He told her that he would
try to send someone out to check into it, but later discovered
no one would be available for the next week or so. After
that, McClanahan asked Hollenback what the situation was
and for what reason Schrader had been terminated.
Hollenback said that the District Council had hired the two
secretaries who worked for Local 14, and did not have the
money to hire a third secretary. McClanahan said that he did
not consider it to be abnormal for a district council the size
of the Central Michigan Administrative District Council to
have only two secretaries. McClanahan stated that he thought
the Local 31 in Lansing, Michigan, did not have enough of-
fice space to house the District Council. McClanahan said
that Sam Palazzolo talked to him not so much about locating
the District Council in Ypsilanti as putting in his bid to be
the director of the District Council.
McClanahan said that he did not know whether or not
Hollenback ever promised or offered Schrader a job with the
District Council if she got out of Teamsters 580. He said that
Hollenback had never discussed with him which labor orga-
nization represented Schrader. He said he had no knowledge
of the taped conversation between Hollenback and Schrader
until he read the transcripts. He said that one of his duties
was to investigate whether there is pending litigation, and he
was aware of the unfair labor charge against Local 31 filed
on behalf of Schrader, and the default judgment which re-
sulted. He concluded that the litigation would not affect the
District Council, because he thought it was settled. He said
he was not aware of any actions by Hollenback concerning
Schrader which might have been an unfair labor practice or
otherwise illegal, and he did not know whether Hollenback
had conditioned a job for Schrader with the District Council
on her abandoning Teamsters Local 580.
McClanahan said it was Vice President Weir’s idea to put
the District Council in Ypsilanti. He said he did not report
any problems to Weir involving Hollenback and Schrader.
He said he made no recommendation to Weir concerning the
location of the District Council.
McClanahan said that he did not think there was anything
wrong with the District Council not hiring Schrader when
she called him in June 1992, because the District Council
had the authority to hire clerical employees and any other
staffing they needed if funding allowed it. He said that he
had no discussions with Schrader about her problems with
Hollenback between October 1991 and June 1992.
McClanahan denied telling Hollenback that he had a ter-
rible mess with the Teamsters and had to straighten it out.
He said that he was surprised to learn in a conversation with
Hollenback during 1991 that a clerical employee in the
Bricklayers organization had a membership in the Teamsters
Union. He said Hollenback had told him that he had been
to an ARISA presentation at which he heard that he could
not bring a clerical employee into his own organization.
McClanahan told him that clerical employees could be
brought in as a member of the Bricklayers Union in a sup-
port category. He said that Hollenback had told him that
Teamsters Local 164 was not going to renew the contract,
and that Teamsters Local 580 had contacted him. He said
that he understood from Hollenback that he was negotiating
with Local 580.
At Hollenback’s request, he agreed to talk to Schrader. He
said that she called him, and he told her that she could make
a lateral move into the Bricklayers Union in a support cat-
egory, where she would pay the same dues as an apprentice
and would be able to participate in the same fringe benefit
programs. He told her that such agreements were negotiated
at the local level. Schrader said she had contacted the Team-
sters and they had told her they would release her from
membership in the Teamsters if there was a bona fide collec-
tive-bargaining agreement for her with the Bricklayers.
McClanahan told her there was no agreement in place and
one would have to be developed. She said she did not trust
Hollenback, and wanted a guarantee she would not be fired.
She said that she and Hollenback had been arguing over day-
to-day things in the office, and there had been a big blowup
in the office, and the Teamsters had told her not to trust
Hollenback. McClanahan said he told her that he did not
have the authority as director of regionalization programs to
give such guarantees. She asked about her part in the District
Council which was being formed, and he told her that he had
no reason to believe that she would not be part of it. He did
not recall if she said anything about demands Hollenback
was making of her.10
963BRICKLAYERS CENTRAL MICHIGAN ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT COUNCIL
Teamsters Local 580. She said that McClanahan told her she would
have to be released by the Teamsters, and she followed his instruc-
tions by asking the Teamsters to release her, and they agreed to if
she had a contract to get into. She said she was not offered a con-
tract with the Teamsters by Hollenback.
11 Daryl Hollenback appointed Sam Palazzolo to the position of
administrative assistant, and to be a member of the management
committee. He said that he served in that position and as a member
of the management committee at the pleasure of Hollenback.
12 Local 14’s mailing address was Ypsilanti, Michigan, but it ap-
pears to have been interchangeably said to be located in Ann Arbor,
Michigan, because it was located between the two cities.
V.
Sam Palazzolo testified that he was employed by the Dis-
trict Council from April 30, 1992, to January 15, 1993, when
he retired. His title with the District Council was administra-
tive assistant,11 he was a member of the District Council’s
executive committee and its management committee, and he
was also a field representative for Local 14. For 20 years be-
fore that, he was an officer of Bricklayers Local 14 in Ypsi-
lanti, Michigan,12 and for 11 years he was the business agent
of Local 14.
Palazzolo said that he had both a personal and business re-
lationship with his two secretaries at Local 14, Elaine, who
had worked for Local 14 since 1973, and Linda, who had
worked for Local 14 for 3 years.
He said that he had been appointed to the management
committee by Daryl Hollenback, who appointed all of its
members. He said that he did not ask Hollenback to hire
Schrader as a secretary for the District Council, but Schrader
had indicated to him sometime before April 1992 that she
would like a job with the District Council as a secretary. He
recalled there was a problem between Hollenback and
Schrader, which had something to do with an accusation by
Hollenback that Schrader had taken some money. He later
learned that there was also a dispute concerning her union
affiliation.
Palazzolo said that at a management committee meeting he
brought up that the clericals in his office (Local 14) had a
contract with Teamsters Local 164, and that contract con-
tained a successor clause that covered them if the local was
merged with a district council. At that time, he said, it was
contemplated that two secretaries would be hired by the Dis-
trict Council. He said that he did not specifically recommend
that the District Council assume the contract with Teamsters
Local 164, but assumed that the management committee ac-
cepted it as his recommendation. He said that no one on the
management committee objected.
He stated that he never attended a meeting of the execu-
tive committee or the management committee at which there
was discussion about hiring Sue Schrader, or not hiring her
because she was a member of Teamsters Local 580.
Palazzolo said he would have hired her.
When asked who hired Linda and Elaine at the District
Council, he replied ‘‘It would be a hard one to put your fin-
ger on. I guess that would be a responsibility for the Direc-
tor, but that they were really hired or just came with the of-
fice, that is the way it was. It happened.’’ Palazzolo said that
he would have to take the position that the management
committee hired them. But, when asked if Hollenback could
have hired any secretary he wanted, Palazzolo’s response
was: ‘‘That would have been over my dead body. That suc-
cessor clause in the contract is binding, so . . . .’’ Palazzolo
admitted that he lobbied on behalf of his two secretaries to
get them jobs with the District Council.
Palazzolo also recalled that when there was discussion in
the summer of 1992 about hiring a third secretary, Palazzolo
said he would not object if Schrader was hired. He recalled
that Hollenback said something to the effect of over his dead
body.
Palazzolo said he never heard Thomas McClanahan ex-
press an opinion about hiring Schrader, or say anything about
hiring secretaries.
VI.
This case turns on the credibility, or lack of it, of three
people: Ursula Schrader, the Charging Party; Daryl
Hollenback, the director of the District Council; and Thomas
McClanahan, the International Union’s director of regional-
ization projects. There were a number of other witnesses
called in this case, whose testimony I find credible, but not
dispositive of any of the issues in this case.
The evidence of record in this case shows Daryl
Hollenback to be a very ambitious man who, by his own ad-
mission, schemed for 3 or 4 years to obtain for himself the
position he coveted as director of the District Council when
the IU formed it. He viewed that position as a stepping stone
to a future position with the International Union, and made
it clear that he would let nothing stand in his way of moving
to positions of greater authority and power in the Inter-
national Union of Bricklayers. I find from the evidence of
record that he was willing to say whatever suited him in ad-
vancing his career, with no regard for the truth of what he
said. He admitted that he lied to Schrader when he said that
he was under pressure from the International Union to sever
all relationships between Bricklayers Local Union 31 and
Teamsters Local Union 580, and he lied when he attributed
remarks to that effect to Thomas McClanahan and other un-
identified officials of the International Union, which he ad-
mitted were not said to him by McClanahan or any other
International Union representative. I have had the opportunity
to observe and evaluate Hollenback’s demeanor on the stand,
and I find him to have been evasive and deceptive. Although
he admitted to some falsehoods, he admitted only those
which he could not deny because a tape recording was made
of him saying them, and his falsehoods concerning pressure
applied by the International Union and its representative,
Thomas McClanahan. I find that he is not a credible witness.
I have also had the opportunity to observe the demeanor
of Ursula Schrader and Thomas McClanahan, while they tes-
tified as witnesses in this case. I find their demeanor to have
been consistent with truthfulness and candidness and incon-
sistent with deceit and evasion. I have also evaluated their
credibility as witnesses in this case by taking into consider-
ation their motives or lack of motives to fabricate testimony,
the impact truthfulness testimony might have on them per-
sonally, and the extent to which their testimony is reasonable
or unreasonable and corroborated or uncorroborated by the
testimony of other witnesses. After considering all of these
factors, I find that both Schrader and McClanahan testified
truthfully and I credit their testimony relevant to the issues
in this case.
I find that the evidence of record is sufficiently proved by
a preponderance of the evidence that in September 1991, and
964 DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
13 In September 1991 Hollenback also appeared to condition the
offer to Schrader on his being appointed to the position of director
of District Council when it was formed. I find that condition to be
a ruse and to be irrelevant to a determination of whether the District
Council violated the Act as alleged, because (1) it was obvious that
unless he was appointed to be the director he would not be in a posi-
tion to deliver on the promise, (2) it is apparent from the evidence
that by September 1991 he thought that he had the best chance of
getting the appointment, and (3) he was appointed to fill the position
of director, and, as will be discussed, he had the authority to deter-
mine who would be hired to fill the District Council’s clerical posi-
tions, and thus to deliver on his promises to her.
earlier, Hollenback knew that Schrader wanted a job with the
new District Council when it was formed, even if it was lo-
cated in Ypsilanti, Michigan, and he offered her the prospect
of employment by the District Council as a secretary, if she
complied with his demand that she sever her union affiliation
with Teamsters Local Union 580. Hollenback told Ursula
Schrader that he wanted her with him at the District Council
as the District Council’s secretary, subject to two conditions
only, first that he get the job of director of the District Coun-
cil, and second, that she drop her membership in Teamsters
Local Union 580. He told her that it would be helpful to
both of them to go as a ‘‘matched set.’’ As late as April 14,
1992, after he had been appointed by the executive commit-
tee of the International Union to be the director of the Dis-
trict Council, effective April 30, 1992, Hollenback was still
dangling the prospect of a job for her with the District Coun-
cil before Schrader by saying that it was uncertain who
would be picked for the second secretarial job at the District
Council, when, in fact, he had no intention of offering the
job to her.
One thing which is apparent from the evidence in this case
is Daryl Hollenback’s union animus concerning Teamsters
Local Union 580. It is obvious from his statements to
Schrader which she secretly tape recorded. He clearly stated
that he would not recognize Teamsters Local Union 580 as
her collective-bargaining representative, and that he resented
Local 580’s interference in the affairs of Bricklayers Local
Union 31. He said that he would not negotiate with them.
He conditioned a job for Schrader at the District Council
when it was formed on her severing her relationship with
Teamsters Local Union 580. He made it clear that he would
not permit Teamsters Local Union 580 to become involved
in the affairs of the District Council as her collective-bar-
gaining representative. He clearly told her that he wanted her
with him, but not with Teamsters Local Union 580 as her
collective-bargaining representative. He said that the one
thing he was going to accomplish was to get rid of Team-
sters Local Union 580. In his words,
So one thing I will accomplish, that is guaranteed, I
will get rid of those Teamsters, they are going to go.
They can go easy or they can go tough. But go they
are going to. The only thing that is left is what role you
play. That’s the only thing that is left.
The evidence further establishes that Hollenback’s animos-
ity toward Teamsters Local Union 580 was specifically di-
rected to that particular Teamsters local union, rather than
based on some broader objection to the Teamsters Union in
general. It was, after all, Hollenback who first induced
Schrader to join a Teamsters local union in the first place,
and he voluntarily recognized Teamsters Local Union 164
and he negotiated a collective-bargaining agreement with it
as her collective-bargaining representative. His opposition to
Teamsters Local Union 580 surfaced when she announced
she wanted to transfer her union affiliation to it. While he
made it clear he would have continued recognizing Team-
sters Local Union 164 as her collective-bargaining represent-
ative, he flatly refused to recognize Teamsters Local Union
580 in that capacity or to negotiate with it. Further dem-
onstrating that Hollenback harbored no broad antipathy to the
Teamsters Union in general, after the District Council was
formed, and the two secretaries of Bricklayers Local Union
14 became the secretaries of the District Council, Hollenback
continued to recognize Teamsters Local Union 164 as their
collective-bargaining representative. It is quite clear that
Hollenback’s animosity toward Teamsters Local Union 580
stemmed from his personal dislike for that particular union
and its business representative and officers.
Daryl Hollenback’s explicit and implicit promises made to
Ursula Schrader before the District Council was formed that
she would have a job with the District Council if she
dropped her membership in Teamsters Local Union 580,13
clearly discriminated against her because of her union affili-
ation, and constituted almost classic violations of Section
8(a)(1) and (3) of the Act by Hollenback and his employer,
at the time, Bricklayers Local Union 31. The remaining ques-
tion is whether the Central Michigan Administrative District
Council can be held to have violated the Act, as charged in
this complaint, because of its unlawful discrimination against
her as a result of its failure to offer her a job after she had
refused to comply with Hollenback’s demand that she termi-
nate her union affiliation with Teamsters Local Union 580.
The District Council argues that it cannot be held to have
violated the Act because Daryl Hollenback did not select or
hire the two secretaries formerly employed by Bricklayers
Local Union 14 who were hired by the District Council to
fill its clerical positions, and took no steps or actions to pre-
clude or discourage the District Council from hiring Ursula
Schrader. The District Council contends that it cannot be
held responsible for any prior violations of the Act which
Hollenback may have committed before he was appointed to
the post of director of the District Council, because the Dis-
trict Council never considered Schrader for a clerical job and
did not refuse to hire her for a secretarial position because
she retained her membership in Teamsters Local Union 580
over the objections of Daryl Hollenback. I find no merit to
the District Council’s position.
The record shows that Sam Palazzolo, formerly the busi-
ness representative of Bricklayers Local Union 14, and sub-
sequently at all relevant times the administrative assistant at
the District Council after it was formed, aggressively lobbied
the District Council’s executive committee and management
committee on behalf of his two secretaries in an effort to
have them hired by the District Council to fill the Council’s
two clerical positions, and stated many times that the District
Council was obligated to hire them as its clerical staff be-
cause of the successor clause in the contract between Brick-
layers Local Union 14 and Teamsters Local Union 164.
There is no evidence that Daryl Hollenback or anyone else
disputed Palazzolo’s claim that the District Council was obli-
gated under a successor clause in the contract between Local
965BRICKLAYERS CENTRAL MICHIGAN ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT COUNCIL
14 I reject Hollenback’s assertion that at the relevant time he was
unaware that he had the sole authority to hire clerical employees for
the District Council. I find it improbable in the extreme that
Hollenback, who admittedly schemed for 3 or 4 years to get the job
of director of the District Council, which he viewed as a stepping
stone to greater power as an employee of the International Union,
would fail to ascertain what his powers as director were, or that he
would voluntarily relinquish any of his powers as director, unless he
felt that by doing so he could achieve some other goal. In this case
it is obvious that Hollenback hoped that by allowing the secretaries
of Local Union 14 to assume the jobs of the District Council’s cleri-
cal staff virtually by default, he would be able to say exactly what
he now says, he had no role in hiring the District Council’s secretar-
ies, and he did not discriminate against Schrader as director of the
District Council.
15 The District Council actually had authority to hire three secretar-
ies, but for financial reasons at least initially did not consider hiring
more than two.
16 At the same time, Hollenback was able to placate Palazzolo,
who had been his principal rival for the director’s job. Palazzolo
made it clear to everyone that he was going to fight to get District
Council jobs for his two secretaries at Local 14. He candidly admit-
ted that ‘‘it would have been over his dead body,’’ if Hollenback
had attempted to hire someone else.
14 and Teamsters Local 164 to hire the two secretaries of
Local 14. But, neither is there any evidence that any other
member of either the executive committee or the manage-
ment committee, or, for that matter, Daryl Hollenback, who
had been appointed to be the first director of the District
Council, ever read the contract between Local 14 and Team-
sters Local 164.
There is no credible evidence in this case that either the
District Council’s executive committee or its management
committee voted to hire the two secretaries of Local 14 as
the secretaries for the District Council, or considered and did
not hire Ursula Schrader for a clerical job with the District
Council. Neither is there any evidence that either the execu-
tive committee or the management voted to authorize the
District Council to assume the collective-bargaining contract
between Bricklayers Local Union 14 and Teamsters Local
Union 164, which covered Bricklayers Local 14’s two sec-
retaries, nor did either body vote to authorize Sam Palazzolo
to inform Teamsters Local 164 that the District Council
would assume the contract with Bricklayers Local 14, or to
inform his secretaries that they would be hired as the District
Council’s secretaries.
The evidence conclusively establishes that Palazzolo acted
without authority from either the District Council’s executive
committee or management committee when he made a tele-
phone call, in the presence of and without objection by
Hollenback, to Teamsters Local Union 164, during which he
committed the District Council to honoring the successor
clause in Teamsters Local Union 164’s collective-bargaining
agreement by hiring the two secretaries of Bricklayers Local
Union 14. Under these circumstances, I find that Hollenback
by his knowing silence at the very least ratified Palazzolo’s
actions.
While Sam Palazzolo seems to have let no opportunity slip
by to lobby the executive committee and the management
committee on behalf of his secretaries, there is equally clear
evidence that Hollenback remained completely silent con-
cerning his secretary, Schrader. Several members of those
two bodies testified that Hollenback never brought up the
name of Ursula Schrader as a candidate for a clerical job
with the District Council. There is no evidence that either the
executive committee or the management committee ever dis-
cussed the possibility of hiring Schrader as a secretary for
the District Council.
The constitution of the District Council adopted on May
12, 1992, vests the authority to hire the District Council’s
clerical staff in the director. It does not confer any authority
to hire the clerical staff on either the executive committee or
the management committee. The intense lobbying effort by
Sam Palazzolo directed to the executive committee and the
management committee on behalf of his two secretaries was
essentially meaningless, unless Director Hollenback, who had
the actual authority to hire the clerical staff, stood by silently
and abdicated his authority. The evidence in this case estab-
lishes that is exactly what Hollenback did. He had the sole
authority to determine who to hire to fill the two secretarial
jobs at the District Council, but chose to remain silent and
not to exercise that authority.14
I find that the evidence shows that as a result of
Hollenback’s deliberate inaction, Local 14’s two secretaries,
who were in place in the office taken over by the District
Council from Local 14, became the District Council’s sec-
retaries virtually by default. Without any formal designation,
simply because they were there they took over the work of
the District Council as it started operation and Local 14
phased out its operations. As Palazzolo put it, he guessed it
was the director’s responsibility, but they ‘‘just came with
the office, that is the way it was. It just happened.’’
Simply put, Daryl Hollenback found it unnecessary to do
anything positive to carry through on his discriminatory
threat not to hire his secretary at Local Union 31 for a cleri-
cal job at the District Council unless she terminated her
membership in Teamsters Local Union 580, something which
she did not do. Inaction was all that was necessary. He did
not disclose to the executive committee and the management
committee that she wanted a job with the District Council as
one of its secretaries,15 and then stood silently by while Sam
Palazzolo lobbied the executive committee and management
committee on behalf of the secretaries of Local 14, and al-
lowed Sam Palazzolo to make a commitment to Teamsters
Local Union 164 that the District Council would assume
Bricklayers Local Union 14’s contract, a commitment which
Palazzolo did not have the authority to make.16 He continued
to stand silently by and allowed Local 14’s two secretaries
to take over the work of the District Council, and eventually,
to be put on the District Council’s payroll.
The Act can be violated by inaction as well as action. In
this case, Hollenback did not need to take any action to carry
through on his unlawful threat and prevent Schrader from
getting a job with the District Council. All that was required
to achieve that goal was to remain silent, and by his silence,
acquiesce in Palazzolo’s determined efforts to get the clerical
jobs at the District Council for his two former secretaries
employed by Local 14. While still the business agent for
Local 31, Hollenback had threatened Schrader with retalia-
tion, in the form of not hiring her to work for the District
Council, if she did not terminate her membership in Team-
sters Local Union 580, which she refused to do. When he
became director of the District Council, he had the sole au-
thority to select and hire the District Council’s clerical staff,
966 DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
and he exercised that authority by not offering her a job at
the District Council as one of its secretaries, exactly as he
had told her the consequences would be if she did not accede
to his demands.
The reason Schrader was not offered a secretarial job at
the District Council was because District Council Director
Hollenback did not offer it to her, and he did not offer it to
her because of her protected union activity, a clear violation
of Section 8(a)(3) and (1) of the Act. His argument that he
played no role in selecting the District Council’s secretaries
is a transparent attempt to disguise the fact that Schrader was
not offered the job because he chose not to offer it to her.
The mechanism by which he denied Schrader the job at the
District Council was to abdicate his hiring authority to Sam
Palazzolo, his administrative assistant, knowing that given a
free hand, Palazzolo would carry out his own agenda by
placing Local 14’s two secretaries in the two secretarial jobs
at the District Council, thereby relieving Hollenback from the
necessity of doing anything to achieve his goal of denying
a secretarial job at the District Council to Schrader. I find
that the evidence offered by the General Counsel is sufficient
to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that Daryl
Hollenback, as the director of the District Council, had the
sole authority under its constitution to hire its clerical staff,
and in his capacity as director of the District Council he
chose to not offer a secretarial job at the District Council to
Schrader because she had engaged in protected union activ-
ity. Since he was acting on behalf of the District Council in
not offering her a job, and he was motivated by union ani-
mus in not making the job offer, the District Council, as his
employer, is responsible for his actions and violated Section
8(a)(1) and (3) of the Act by unlawfully discriminating
against Schrader because she engaged in protected union ac-
tivity.
VII.
The complaint in this case also names the International
Union of Bricklayers as a respondent. On consideration of all
of the evidence of record, I find that the General Counsel has
not proven by a preponderance of the evidence that the Inter-
national Union violated the Act as alleged in the complaint.
Therefore, I will dismiss the complaint against the Inter-
national Union.
There is no evidence that any official of the International
Union, including Thomas McClanahan, its director of region-
alization projects, was aware at any relevant time that Daryl
Hollenback had promised Schrader a job with the District
Council, or had unlawfully threatened her by telling her that
she would not be hired by the District Council as a secretary
unless she severed her union affiliation with Teamsters Local
Union 580. I credit McClanahan’s testimony that he first
learned that Schrader had not been hired as a secretary by
the District Council when she called him on June 4, 1992,
and reported that she had been laid off by Bricklayers Local
31. There is no evidence to show that McClanahan or any
other International Union official ever made a statement to
Daryl Hollenback or anyone else that the International Union
would not accept her involvement with Teamsters Local
Union 580. There is no evidence that the International Union
exercised any control over who the District Council hired as
clerical employees once the District Council had been
formed and a director had been appointed, or that the District
Council was acting as an agent of the International Union.
There is no dispute that McClanahan knew in September
1991 that Ursula Schrader was involved in a National Labor
Relations Board case against Bricklayers Local Union 31. I
credit McClanahan’s testimony that he thought the case had
been settled and did not give it any further consideration.
McClanahan acknowledged that he knew there was a dis-
pute between Hollenback and Schrader centered on member-
ship in the Teamsters Union. He testified that he was sur-
prised that clerical employees of Bricklayers local unions
were represented by the Teamsters Union, and that after he
learned of this, he told both Hollenback and Schrader that
Schrader could join the Bricklayers Union in a support cat-
egory under which she would pay the dues of an apprentice
and receive fringe benefits. He said that both Hollenback and
Schrader appeared interested. In the course of a telephone
conversation with Schrader, she told him that she did not
trust Hollenback because of a money matter dispute, and
wanted a guarantee that Hollenback would not fire her. In a
minor discrepancy in testimony, McClanahan said he told her
he did not have the authority to make that kind of guarantee,
while Schrader recalled that he said for her not to worry, she
was not going to be fired. McClanahan said that he did tell
her that he had no reason to believe that she would not be
part of the District Council when it was formed.
Louis Weir, the International Union’s executive vice presi-
dent said he recommended that the District Council be co-
located in Ypsilanti, Michigan, with Bricklayers Local Union
14, and he recommended that Daryl Hollenback be appointed
to be its first director. He said that he recommended the Yp-
silanti location because he wanted to throw a bone to Sam
Palazzolo. He said he vaguely remembered something about
a dispute between Hollenback and his secretary, but he did
not recall any of the details and knew nothing about the sub-
ject of the dispute. He said that the International Union plays
no part in a district council’s selection of its clerical employ-
ees.
I credit the testimony of Ursula Schrader, Thomas
McClanahan, and Louis Weir. I find that there is no credible
evidence that the International Union, or any of its officials,
knew or should have known that Hollenback had threatened
not to hire Schrader as his secretary at the District Council,
because she was engaging in protected union activity involv-
ing Teamsters Local Union 580. It is clear that McClanahan,
as a representative of the International Union knew that
Schrader was represented by a Teamsters local union, and he
pointed out to both Schrader and Hollenback that she was el-
igible to join the Bricklayers Union. But, based on that
alone, I find no evidence of union animus by McClanahan
toward the Teamsters Union or any of its local union. It is
worth noting here that Bricklayers Local Union 31 was not
the only local union in Michigan whose clerical employees
were represented by a Teamsters Union local. Palazzolo’s
own local union, Bricklayers Local 41, also had a collective-
bargaining agreement with a Teamsters Union local, albeit
not Teamsters Local Union 580, covering its two clerical em-
ployees. It would be very inconsistent and make very little
sense for the International Union on the one hand to object
to the participation of Teamsters Local Union 580 in the af-
fairs of either Bricklayers Local Union 31 or the future Dis-
trict Council, and on the other hand to accept without objec-
967BRICKLAYERS CENTRAL MICHIGAN ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT COUNCIL
17 If no exceptions are filed as provided by Sec. 102.46 of the
Board’s Rules and Regulations, the findings, conclusions, and rec-
ommended Order shall, as provided in Sec. 102.48 of the Rules, be
adopted by the Board and all objections to them shall be deemed
waived for all purposes.
18 If this Order is enforced by a judgment of a United States court
of appeals, the words in the notice reading ‘‘Posted by Order of the
National Labor Relations Board’’ shall read ‘‘Posted Pursuant to a
Judgment of the United States Court of Appeals Enforcing an Order
of the National Labor Relations Board.’’
tion the involvement of Teamsters Local Union 164 at the
District Council level as the collective-bargaining representa-
tive of the two secretaries who were hired by the District
Council.
I agree with Respondent International Union that this
record shows no basis on which the International Union can
be held responsible for unfair labor practices committed by
Respondent District Council, and its director, against Charg-
ing Party Ursula Schrader. I also agree with Respondent
International Union that the record discloses no evidence that
the District Council had either actual or apparent authority to
act as the International Union’s agent in hiring the District
Council’s secretaries, such that it might be argued that the
District Council was acting as an agent of the International
when it did not offer Charging Party Schrader a secretarial
job at the District Council in retaliation for her protected
union activities.
CONCLUSIONS OF LAW
1. By not offering Charging Party Ursula Schrader a sec-
retarial position at Respondent District Council’s office in
Ypsilanti, Michigan, in or about May 1992, in retaliation for
her preference for Local 580, International Brotherhood of
Teamsters, AFL–CIO, rather that Local 164, International
Brotherhood of Teamsters, AFL–CIO, the Central Michigan
Administrative District Council of the International Union of
Bricklayers and Allied Craftsmen, AFL–CIO, has engaged in
unfair labor practices affecting commerce within the meaning
of Section 8(a)(3) and (1) and Section 2(6) and (7) of the
Act.
2. The General Counsel has not proven by a preponder-
ance of the evidence that Respondent International Union of
Bricklayers and Allied Craftsmen, AFL–CIO engaged in un-
fair labor practices within the meaning of Section 8(a)(3) and
(1) of the Act, as alleged in the complaint.
REMEDY
Having found that Respondent Central Michigan Adminis-
trative District Council, International Union of Bricklayers
and Allied Craftsmen, AFL–CIO has engaged in certain un-
fair labor practices, I find that it must be ordered to cease
and desist and to take certain affirmative action designed to
effectuate the policies of the Act.
Respondent Central Michigan Administrative District
Council having discriminatorily failed to offer Charging
Party Ursula Schrader a secretarial position at its office in
Ypsilanti, Michigan, in or about May 1992, it must offer her
a position and make her whole for any loss of earnings and
other benefits, computed on a quarterly basis from the date
of its failure to offer the secretarial position to her, to the
date of a proper offer of employment, less any net interim
earnings, as prescribed in F. W. Woolworth Co., 90 NLRB
289 (1950), plus interest as computed in New Horizons for
the Retarded, 283 NLRB 1173 (1987).
On these findings of fact and conclusions of law and on
the entire record, I issue the following recommended17
ORDER
The Respondent, Central Michigan Administrative District
Council, Ypsilanti, Michigan, its officers, agents, successors,
and assigns, shall
1. Cease and desist from
(a) Discriminating against applicants for employment by
the Central Michigan Administrative District Council because
they belong to or support Teamsters Local Union 580, Inter-
national Brotherhood of Teamsters, AFL–CIO or any other
union.
(b) In any like or related manner restraining or coercing
applicants for employment in the exercise of the rights guar-
anteed them by Section 7 of the Act.
2. Take the following affirmative action necessary to ef-
fectuate the policies of the Act.
(a) Offer Charging Party Ursula Schrader immediate and
full employment to the position in which she would have
been employed but for the discrimination against her or, if
that position no longer exists, to a substantially equivalent
position, without prejudice to her seniority or any other
rights and privileges to which she would have been entitled
absent the discrimination against her, discharging, if nec-
essary, any employees hired in her place, and make her
whole for any loss of earnings and other benefits suffered as
a result of the discrimination against her in the manner set
forth in the remedy section of the decision.
(b) Preserve and, on request, make available to the Board
or its agents for examination and copying, all payroll records,
social security payment records, timecards, personnel records
and reports, and all other records necessary to analyze the
amount of backpay due under the terms of this Order.
(c) Post at its union office in Ypsilanti, Michigan, copies
of the attached notice marked ‘‘Appendix.’’18 Copies of the
notice, on forms provided by the Regional Director for Re-
gion 7, after being signed by Respondent Central Michigan
Administrative District Council’s authorized representative,
shall be posted by the Respondent immediately upon receipt
and maintained for 60 consecutive days in conspicuous
places including all places where notices to employees and
members are customarily posted. Reasonable steps shall be
taken by the Respondent to ensure that the notices are not
altered, defaced, or covered by any other material.
(d) Notify the Regional Director in writing within 20 days
from the date of this Order what steps the Respondent has
taken to comply.
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the complaint against Re-
spondent International Union of Bricklayers and Allied
Craftsmen, AFL–CIO is dismissed.
968 DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
APPENDIX
NOTICE TO EMPLOYEES AND MEMBERS
POSTED BY ORDER OF THE
NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
An Agency of the United States Government
The National Labor Relations Board has found that we vio-
lated the National Labor Relations Act and has ordered us
to post and abide by this notice.
WE WILL NOT refuse to hire applicants for employment by
the Central Michigan Administrative District Council because
they support Teamsters Local Union 580, International
Brotherhood of Teamsters, AFL–CIO or any other union.
WE WILL NOT in any like or related manner restrain or co-
erce you in the exercise of the rights guaranteed you by Sec-
tion 7 of the Act.
WE WILL offer Ursula Schrader immediate and full em-
ployment to the position in which she would have been em-
ployed but for the discrimination against her, without preju-
dice to her seniority or any other rights and privileges to
which she would have been entitled absent the discrimination
against her, discharging, if necessary any employees hired in
her place, and WE WILL make her whole for any loss of earn-
ings and other benefits suffered as a result of the discrimina-
tion against her, less any net interim earnings, plus interest.
INTERNATIONAL UNION OF BRICKLAYERS AND
ALLIED CRAFTSMEN, AFL–CIO, AND ITS CEN-
TRAL MICHIGAN ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICT
COUNCIL