Orlando, Fla. (June 4, 2002) — Responding to federal charges brought by two Orlando area workers, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) announced it will prosecute the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) Local 835 for threatening to kill or harm workers who participated in efforts to decertify the union.

Local 835 officials operate an exclusive union hiring hall that provides workers in the trade show, convention, and exhibition service industry in the Orlando area.

After investigating the unfair labor practice charges filed by James Zitis and Clay Wayman – who are represented by attorneys with the National Right to Work Foundation – the NLRB investigators found that union officials had “threatened to kill employees” and “threatened employees with the loss of work opportunities and the loss of their homes and possessions” if they engaged in activity to toss the union out of the workplace through an NLRB-supervised election.

“These union thugs have used threats and intimidation to silence dissent,” said Stefan Gleason, Vice President of the National Right to Work Foundation. “This is the kind of outrageous activity that gives union officials such a terrible reputation.”

In addition to naming IATSE Local 835, the NLRB complaint cites two of its top officials, Susan Wolfgang and Peter Merrifield, for their involvement in the harassment. The NLRB has set the hearing date for September 19, 2002.

Even though Florida has a highly popular and effective Right to Work law that frees nonunion employees from paying membership dues to an unwanted union, IATSE union officials use their monopoly bargaining privileges to set up exclusive hiring halls. In such halls, the union decides which employees to refer for work at conventions and trade shows, and the workers are forced to pay the union to be eligible for work.

This is not the first finding of unfair labor practices by the NLRB against IATSE Local 835. Earlier in the year the NLRB forced IATSE union officials to post a notice alerting workers that they only had to pay fees equal to the cost of running the hiring hall. The union had been forcing non-union members to pay fees as a condition of using the hiring hall’s referral service without explaining how the fee was calculated.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses. The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, assists thousands of employees in about 200 cases nationwide per year.