Stand for Security

What About Us?

Security Guards, Labor Relations Law, and the SEIU

Kevin P. Barry

March 2008

1.

Introduction

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, “guards, who are also called

securityofficers

, patrol and inspect property to protect against fire, theft, vandalism, terrorism, and illegalactivity. These workers protect their employer’s investment, enforce laws on the property, anddeter criminal activity and other problems.”

1

There are more than one million security guardsnationwide, with median wages slightly above $10 per hour and $21,000 annually.

2

Theimportance of adequate security has been the subject of significant attention in the post-9/11United States, and the industry continues its steady growth.

3

While there are many types of guards in both government and private industry, the focusof this paper is on those guards employed in the private security industry by contract firms,working at places such as commercial office buildings, public properties, and universities. Theseunarmed guards are, in general, poorly trained, poorly paid, and predominantly African-American. Traditionally, they have also been nonunion. As a result, in recent years the ServiceEmployees International Union (SEIU) has sought to represent them nationwide.

1

U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics,

Occupational Outlook Handbook,

2008-09 Edition,available athttp://www.bls.gov/oco/pdf/ocos159.pdf

2

U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, “Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2006.”

Occupational Employment Statistics

, available athttp://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes339032.htm

3

The Occupational Outlook Handbook states that “concern about crime, vandalism, and terrorism continues toincrease the need for security. Demand for guards also will grow as private security firms increasingly performduties—such as providing security at public events and in residential neighborhoods—that were formerly handled by police officers.” The SEIU also cites BLS data in naming private security as one of the fastest growingoccupations in the U.S. (http://www.seiu.org/property/security/about_industry/

)

2I begin by tracing the history of labor relations law as it relates to security guards, andthen describe how the SEIU, building upon its successful “Justice for Janitors” campaign, has been able to circumvent the relevant law and organize thousands of security guards throughoutthe U.S. as part of its national “Stand for Security” campaign. In particular, I discuss Stand for Security’s origins, organizational structure, basic bargaining objectives, overall approach, andspecific tactical strategies. I also summarize campaign developments in cities across the country,and then take a more detailed look at Los Angeles, which has been an important battleground for the union. I conclude by briefly considering how various issues surrounding the SEIU’sorganization and representation of security guards may influence the future of the campaign.

2. Background

(i) Wagner Act and Subsequent Period (1935-47)

The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) was passed in 1935. Also known in its initialform as the Wagner Act, the NLRA gave workers the right to organize, engage in collective bargaining, and strike, and it established the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to preventunfair labor practices and conduct union representation elections. With respect to theseelections, section 9(b) of the Act conferred exclusive authority to the NLRB to determine andcertify the appropriate bargaining unit under the law, as follows:“The Board shall decide in each case whether, in order to insure to employees thatfull benefit of their right to self-organization and to collective bargaining, andotherwise effectuate the policies of this Act, the unit appropriate for the purposesof collective bargaining shall be the employer unit, craft unit, plant unit, or subdivision thereof.”

3Because the Act gave the NLRB full discretion to make its own bargaining unitdeterminations, and Congress offered no guidance, the Board was free to create its own policies.

4

However, its flexible interpretations as to what constituted an “appropriate bargaining unit”quickly became the source of significant controversy involving employers, organized labor,Congress, and the courts. Amid this controversy, the Supreme Court repeatedly upheld the NLRB’s right to determine bargaining units under the NLRA.

5

The issue of security guards, however, did not become prominent until World War II.Guards had not traditionally been unionized, but during the war many plant guards attempted toorganize.

6

Despite the general objections of employers, who maintained that the nature of guards’ responsibilities and their relationship with management precluded the right to unionrepresentation, the NLRB ruled that the protections granted under the Act to employees didindeed extend to guards.In determining appropriate bargaining units for guards, the Board generally placed themin separate units, though in some instances combined them with production and maintenanceemployees. These determinations depended on such factors as whether or not the guards weremilitarized (mainly an issue during the war) and whether their functions were more monitorial or custodial in nature; however, these criteria were not consistently applied.

7

Further, even whenthe Board did place guards in separate bargaining units, it put no restrictions on their choice of bargaining representative, such that a guard unit could have as its agent the same union already

4

Benjamin Rathbun, Jr., “The Taft-Hartley Act and Craft Unit Bargaining.”

The Yale Law Journal

, Vol. 59, No. 6(May, 1950), pp. 1024-6.

5

E.B. McNatt, “The ‘Appropriate Bargaining Unit’ Problem.”

The Quarterly Journal of Economics

, Vol. 56, No. 1,Part 1 (Nov., 1941), pp. 93-107.

6

Fred Witney, “The Appropriate Bargaining Unit Controversy.”

Southern Economic Journal

, Vol. 16, No. 2 (Oct.,1949), p. 180.