Earlier this week, NACS joined other employer groups in strong opposition to the National Labor Relations Board€™s (NLRB) proposal to streamline the process for workers to organize.
NACS members are needed to join the fight and send a message to Congress opposing the NLRB€™s proposal. The NLRB€™s rules would shorten the period between a union€™s petition filing and the election, effectively limiting the employer€™s ability to communicate with employees prior to a vote. The unions argue that this time period simply allows employers to thwart organizing efforts.
If the NLRB is successful in its attempt to streamline elections, companies, especially small businesses, would be deprived of the opportunity to seek legal consult and to communicate with their workers prior to a vote.
The proposed rules would postpone many employers€™ challenges until after elections, remove a 25 to 30 day waiting period, and require employers to include cell phone numbers and email addresses in the employee lists they provide to organizers.
The Washington Post speculated that the rules "could conceivably shorten the period between a petition filing and election to as little as 10 days," down from the current average of 38 days.
The hearings concluded yesterday and NLRB is accepting comments until late August.
Click Here to Tell Congress to Oppose the New NLRB Election Rules
Washington is currently at a standstill. The August 2nd deadline to raise the debt ceiling is quickly approaching and negotiations on Saturday at the White House collapsed with Congress walking away after 46 minutes. With only 9 days until the United States reaches its debt ceiling, Speaker Boehner has announced that he has put together a compromise. Whether the President will sign off on it is unknown.
On July 20, the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee held a hearing on highway funding titled, "Building American Transportation Infrastructure through Innovative Funding." Although rest area commercialization was not brought up specifically, Robert Dove of Carlyle Infrastructure Partners did discuss his company€™s project in Connecticut during his opening remarks:
"Carlyle Infrastructure Partners invests in companies that contract with state and local governments throughout the United States to provide services, such as treatment of biosolids at the end of the wastewater treatment process, school bus transportation, and other infrastructure-based services. I would like to highlight our recent innovative partnership with the State of Connecticut to redevelop, operate, and maintain Connecticut€™s 23 highway service areas across the state. In this case, our fund formed a 35-year public-private partnership with the State of Connecticut to finance the redevelopment and operations of highway service areas..."
Dove did not reveal recent findings from a Virginia Tech Study that predicted a $600 decrease in tax revenue for localities nationwide in 2010. He also left out that the study predicts a 46% decrease in interstate-serving retail fuel sales in each county, a 44% decrease in sales at restaurants, and a 35% decrease in truck service sales at truck service businesses as a result of rest area commercialization.
Click Here to Tell Congress to Oppose Rest Stop Commercialization