Labor board rules vote aimed at ousting school union will proceed

Despite attempts to block it in the Nevada Supreme Court, a decade-long fight to unseat the labor union representing all support staff for the Clark County School District will move forward in the coming months.

The three-member Local Government Employee Management-Relations Board on Wednesday unanimously denied a motion from the Education Support Employees Association, which represents more than 11,000 bus drivers, janitors, cooks and other school support staff, to postpone an election planned for November. The state Supreme Court is now weighing whether to declare the ballot contest illegal.

A Clark County District Court judge last week declined the ESEA's request, saying a prior Supreme Court ruling does not permit court review before an election actually takes place.

The ESEA immediately appealed that decision to the state's highest court and asked the EMRB to wait for a final decision before spending nearly $21,000 on the November election.

"ESEA's litigation strategy is to prevent this election and stop it altogether. That shouldn't come as a surprise to anybody," Frank Flaherty, an attorney for the union, said Wednesday.

"There's absolutely no harm in waiting for the Nevada Supreme Court to rule because the board will have saved substantial taxpayer dollars and board resources,'' he said. "ESEA and Local 14 will save some money, as well, but more importantly neither will waste their time campaigning in what (could be) determined to be an unlawful election."

In February, 71 percent of support staff who voted in a special election chose the Teamsters as their representative, a role filled for more than four decades by the ESEA. However, only 5,190 votes were cast, far short of a supermajority then required by the EMRB.

To reach a supermajority, one union must get 50 percent plus 1 of all union members to vote in its favor. But the EMRB earlier this year voted to change that 13-year-old policy, instead requiring just a simple majority of those who vote in the election.

An attorney for the Teamsters, which since 2002 has tried to oust the ESEA, described the ESEA appeal to the Supreme Court as a "last-minute, eve-of-the-election" effort to postpone the election.

"The ballots have already been printed. The money has already been spent," said attorney Kristin Davis. "There's no need to act now, given that we have six weeks until the EMRB (sends) the ballots out."

An amended election plan includes mailing members ballots on Nov. 2, to be returned in time for a Dec. 5 count.

Contact Neal Morton at nmorton@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0279. Find him on Twitter: @nealtmorton.