Nurses of the Salt Lake Regional Medical Center in Utah are the latest victims of the National Labor Relations Board’s three supervisor rulings, which vastly expanded the definition of supervisor and potentially denied millions of workers their freedom of association. 

When the nurses voted on union representation back in 2002, their employer filed an objection with the NLRB claiming that most of the nurses were “supervisors”—which stalled the election process and kept the nurses’ ballots locked up. 

Based on one of the 2006 supervisor rulings, the NLRB regional director recently determined that nearly half of the nurses were supervisors.  The nurses just announced that they are giving up their effort to form a union because of “the current climate with its wild and bizarre interpretation of the rule where everyone can be a supervisor."  Their 5-year-old ballots will remain uncounted.

All the RNs in the neonatal intensive care unit were declared to be supervisors, essentially “supervising” each other on a rotating basis.  In the inpatient rehabilitation unit, 10 of the 12 RNs were declared to be supervisors.  In the newborn nursery, 10 of 12 RNs were also declared to be supervisors.  In the labor and delivery unit, the ratio of supervisors to nonsupervisory employees was 12 to 5. In the surgical unit, the ratio was 10 to 7.

Clearly, the laws that are supposed to protect workers are more than broken – we are just beginning to see the fallout from the Bush Labor Board’s disastrous rulings.  Here’s to hoping help for workers is on the way.