NLRB Names Three New Administrative Law Judges

WASHINGTON, D.C.--The National Labor Relations Board announced the appointment of three new administrative law judges, Mara-Louise Anzalone, John Giannopoulos, and Sharon Steckler. The three judges will join the Board’s Division of Judges after previously serving in the same capacity at the Social Security Administration. All three have a deep knowledge of labor and employment law from their previous work as Board agents and careers in private practice.
With offices in Washington, D.C., New York City, San Francisco and Atlanta, the Division of Judges is responsible for docketing unfair labor practice cases brought by the Board’s General Counsel on charges filed by unions, employers, and individual employees. The Division disposes of those cases by settlement or by conducting trials and issuing initial decisions, which may then be appealed to the five-member Board and thereafter to an appropriate United States Court of Appeals.
Prior to her appointment as a Social Security Administration judge, Judge Anzalone spent 11 years as a trial attorney with the Board’s Region 28 Office in Phoenix and Region 19 in Seattle, where she handled some of the regions’ more significant cases, including the high-profile Boeing case. Before joining the Board, she spent eight years in private practice specializing in labor and employment law with several firms, including Seyfarth Shaw. Judge Anzalone received her B.A. degree, magna cum laude, from the University of Maryland and her J.D. from New York University School of Law.  She will be assigned to the Division’s San Francisco office. 
Judge Giannopoulos was a trial lawyer and supervisor for the Board’s Region 28 Office based in Phoenix prior to his time at the Social Security Administration. Before joining the Board, he spent two years in private practice. He also worked as a consultant with Deloitte & Touche. Giannopoulos received his B.A. degree in Finance from the University of Utah and his M.B.A. in Finance from the University of Wisconsin. He received his J.D. from the University of Utah.  He will initially take his assignments from the Division’s New York office, but later will relocate to the West Coast and take his assignments from the Division’s San Francisco office.   
Before joining the Social Security Administration, Judge Steckler was a supervisory attorney in the NLRB’s Region 16 Office in Fort Worth. Steckler also served as a field attorney for Region 14 in St. Louis.  Prior to coming to the Board, she worked in private practice and as a law clerk in the Missouri Court of Appeals.  She earned her B.S.N. at Vanderbilt University and a Master’s degree in Human Resources Management at Washington University in St. Louis.  Before attending law school, she was a nurse and a nurse educator. She also taught human resources management at Lindenwood University in Saint Charles, Missouri. Judge Steckler received her J.D., cum laude, from St. Louis University School of Law. She will be assigned to the Division’s Washington, D.C. office. 
The NLRB is an independent federal agency tasked with enforcing the National Labor Relations Act, which guarantees the right of most private sector employees to organize, to engage in group efforts to improve their wages and working conditions, to determine whether to have unions as their bargaining representative, to engage in collective bargaining, and to refrain from any of these activities. It acts to prevent and remedy unfair labor practices committed by private sector employers and unions.