Dispute between unions and Station Casinos continue

The National Labor Relations Board has accused Station Casinos of undermining unions while the company rejects the allegations as “biased and unfair”.

US.- The dispute between the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and Station Casinos continues in Las Vegas.

The NLRB claimed this week that the company has unlawfully used the pandemic to undermine unions and influence employees to push for decertification.

Last year, employees at Boulder Station Hotel and Casino filed a petition to leave the culinary and bartenders unions they joined in 2016 because they were unable to take up any healthcare or retirement benefits.

The unions, Culinary Local 226 and Bartenders Local 165, responded by filing a complaint against Boulder Station, claiming that the casino had withdrawn union recognition unlawfully. The casino has denied responsibility, claiming it was the decision of employees.

According to Las Vegas Review Journal, NLRB Regional Director Cornele Overstreet, whose area includes Las Vegas, has now issued a 92-page complaint against Red Rock Resorts Inc., Station Holdco LLC, Station Casinos LLC and 10 of their Las Vegas casinos.

The complaint alleges that the companies “engaged in a scheme to use layoffs during the Covid-19 pandemic to undermine unions representing or seeking to represent their employees”.

The release claims that Station laid off, fired, rehired and recalled employees, terminated their recall rights and benefits and implemented new health and safety standards “all without bargaining” with the unions.

It said the company behaved “in a selective and discriminatory manner that was calculated to dilute union support among their employees”. The NLRB also accused the company of anti-union messaging.

The company responded in a statement: “Over the course of a decade, the company has been under attack by the Culinary Union and has learned that they are willing to say and do anything in an attempt to force our Team Members into their union.

“Now, with a willing accomplice in the NLRB Regional Director, the union is attempting to strip our Team Members of their democratic right to choose whether they want union representation or not. They are mischaracterizing all the great things we have done for our Team Members as a negative because, as they claim, ‘it undermines the union.’”