Alcoa, Inc. and Alcoa Commercial Windows, LLC d/b/a TRACO, A Single Employer - Decision Summary

Alcoa, Inc. and Alcoa Commercial Windows, LLC d/b/a TRACO, A Single Employer, Board Case No.06-CA-065365 (reported at 363 NLRB No. 39) (5th Cir. decided February 22, 2017)

In a published opinion, the court enforced the Board’s order in full, upholding the Board’s determination of single-employer status and its unfair labor practice findings.In September 2011, a few unionized Alcoa employees, represented by United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, AFL-CIO, CLC, attempted to communicate with their non-unionized counterparts at Traco about the benefits of unionization.They requested access to Traco’s parking lots for this organizational purpose, but the companies, under the leadership of Alcoa’s industrial relations department, denied their access request.

The Board (then-Chairman Pearce and Members Hirozawa and McFerran) found that Alcoa, a large multinational corporation that mines bauxite and manufactures related aluminum products, became a single employer with Traco, a non-unionized window and door manufacturing business. In so holding, the Board applied the four-factor test for determining single-employer status set forth inSouth Prairie Construction Co. v. Local No. 627, Int’l Union of Operating Engineers, 425 U.S. 800, 802 n.3 (1976): (1) common ownership, (2) interrelation of operations, (3) common control of labor relations, and (4) common management.The Board then assessed the access rights of the off-site Alcoa employees to distribute union-related literature in the parking lots and exterior nonworking areas at the Traco facility under the test set forth inHillhaven Highland House, 336 NLRB 646 (2001),enforced, 344 F.3d 523 (6th Cir. 2003), andITT Industries, Inc., 341 NLRB 937 (2004),enforced, 413 F.3d 64 (D.C. Cir. 2005), finding that the companies violated Section 8(a)(1) of the Act by refusing to allow them access.The Board also found that the companies violated Section 8(a)(1) by surveilling employee handbilling.

On review, the court held that substantial evidence supported the Board’s finding that the companies qualify as a single employer.Specifically, the court agreed with the Board on the two disputed factors, finding that the companies had interrelated operations based on multiple ways they had held themselves out to the public and their employees as a single entity, and had common control of labor relations, as evidenced in part by Alcoa’s decision to bar the employees from accessing Traco’s facility.On the access issue, the court rejected the companies’ contention that the Board should not have applied the principles ofHillhavenandITTin this single-employer context, and held that doing so was consistent with the purpose of Section 8(a)(1).The court explained that, in discussing why Section 8(a)(1) rights apply to offsite employees, “bothHillhavenandITTstress the idea that similarly situated employees (even at different facilities) derive strength in numbers because together they can collectively push for better working conditions.” Therefore, the court held that the question in determining consistency with the statute “is whether applying the single-employer doctrine in this context serves to protect employees’ rights to collectively pressure their employer. We hold that it does.” Given the Employer did not contest the remainder of the Board findings, the court enforced the order in full.

The court’s opinion ishere.