Protest Decisions

OFFICE OF THE ELECTION SUPERVISOR

for the

INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS

IN RE: DON FAUTH,                                 )           Protest Decision 2016 ESD 177

                                                                        )           Issued: April 20, 2016

            Protestor.                                           )           OES Case No. P-149-020616-MW   

____________________________________)                                                                  

Don Fauth, member and delegate candidate in Local Union 89, filed a pre-election protest pursuant to Article XIII, Section 2(b) of the Rules for the 2015-2016 IBT International Union Delegate and Officer Election (“Rules”).  The protest alleged that the Zuckerman-Bolton slate impermissibly interfered with campaigning of the Hourly Workers Unite to Lower Dues! and made threats of physical violence against them.[1]

Election Supervisor representative Joe Childers investigated this protest.

Findings of Fact and Analysis

            Local Union 89 is entitled to elect eighteen delegates and eighteen alternate delegate to the IBT convention.  At its nominations meeting held January 6, 2016, two full slates and no unaffiliated candidates were nominated.  Ballots were mailed February 5 and were counted March 2.  All candidates on the Zuckerman-Bolton slate received more votes than any candidate on the Hourly Workers Unite to Lower Dues! slate.  On 3,273 ballots counted, the margin between the winning delegate candidate with the fewest votes and the losing delegate candidate with the most votes was 981; the corresponding margin in the alternate delegates race was 975.

            Protestor Fauth alleged that while candidates and supporters of the Hourly Workers Unite slate campaigned in and near the parking lot at Jeffboat, a barge manufacturer in Louisville, Kentucky, during afternoon shift change on February 4, 2016, a member campaigning with Zuckerman-Bolton slate candidates took Hourly Workers Unite literature from members entering and exiting the Jeffboat facility and encouraged those members not to support the Hourly Workers slate.  According to the protest, Jim Kincaid, a business agent for Local Union 89 and candidate for alternate delegate on the Zuckerman-Bolton slate, also instructed his colleague, not a slate member, to remove campaign stickers for the Hourly Workers slate from members’ hats.

The protester asserted that between 700 and 800 members of Local Union 89 are employed at Jeffboat on three shifts.  Investigation showed that no more than 200 members used the gate in question during the incident.  

We deferred this pre-election protest for post-election consideration, pursuant to Article XIII, Section 2(f)(2).  Under Article XIII, Section 3(b), “[p]ost-election protests shall only be considered and remedied if the alleged violation may have affected the outcome of the election.”  Under the circumstances, we need not determine whether the conduct alleged violated the Rules because, given the wide margin that decided this election and the comparatively small segment of local union membership exposed to the allegedly impermissible campaign conduct, the conduct did not affect the outcome of the election, even were it to constitute a Rules violation.

Accordingly, we DENY this protest.

Any interested party not satisfied with this determination may request a hearing before the Election Appeals Master within two (2) working days of receipt of this decision.  The parties are reminded that, absent extraordinary circumstances, no party may rely upon evidence that was not presented to the Office of the Election Supervisor in any such appeal.  Requests for a hearing shall be made in writing, shall specify the basis for the appeal, and shall be served upon:

Kathleen A. Roberts

Election Appeals Master

JAMS

620 Eighth Avenue, 34^th floor

New York, NY 10018

kroberts@jamsadr.com

Copies of the request for hearing must be served upon the parties, as well as upon the Election Supervisor for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, 1050 17^th Street, N.W., Suite 375, Washington, D.C. 20036, all within the time prescribed above.  A copy of the protest must accompany the request for hearing.

                                                                        Richard W. Mark

                                                                        Election Supervisor

cc:        Kathleen A. Roberts

            2016 ESD 177

DISTRIBUTION LIST (BY EMAIL UNLESS OTHERWISE SPECIFIED):