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Businesses can rely on a recent National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) decision to prevent their contractors from distributing union leaflets on company property. But employers' own employees still must be allowed to distribute leaflets onsite in many instances.
The staff of the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts in San Antonio prevented employees of the San Antonio Symphony, which was a licensee of the center's, from passing out leaflets on its property, including its sidewalks, before a performance by the San Antonio Ballet.
Approximately a dozen members of the symphony protested the use of recorded music during the performance. They were forced to relocate from the Tobin Center grounds to public sidewalks across the street, where they distributed several hundred leaflets.
The protesters challenged the Tobin Center for stopping them from handing out leaflets on the center's property. An administrative law judge ruled in their favor, relying on a 2011 NLRB decision that permitted the employees of a contractor for a business to distribute union literature on the business's property.
When the case reached the NLRB, the board reversed the administrative law judge's decision and overruled the 2011 decision. The board held that a property owner may exclude from its property any off-duty contractor—or licensee—employees who attempt to engage in activity protected by the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) unless:
- Those employees work regularly and exclusively on the property.
- The property owner fails to show...