Settlement ends long-running dispute at Alabama manufacturing plant, 60 employees to be reinstated

The owner of an Alabama manufacturing plant and the union representing its workers have ended a long-running labor dispute through a settlement agreement signed yesterday by NLRB Acting General Counsel Lafe Solomon.
Illinois-based NTN Bower Corp. agreed to reinstate 60 former strikers to their previous jobs at its facility in Hamilton, Alabama, and to distribute $1.85 million in backpay to current and former employees. The company, which manufactures precision roller bearings, also agreed to recognize the United Automobile, Aerospace & Agricultural Workers of America, AFL-CIO as the representative of its employees, and to apply the terms of the previous collective bargaining agreement.
The agreement resolves multiple pending cases, including a 2011 Board decision that was appealed to the D.C. Circuit, a 2012 Administrative Law Judge decision that was on review before the Board, and several recent charges that were under investigation by the Board’s Regional Office. The settlement was reached with the assistance of a volunteer mediatorassigned by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
At issue was the company’s failure to restore a substantial number of former strikers to their jobs following a 2008 strike, as well as the company’s eventual refusal to recognize the union, which had represented employees at the facility for several decades.
“We are very pleased that the company and the union have been able to come together to find a productive and forward-looking solution to this dispute,” said Acting General Counsel Solomon. “We fully expect this agreement to be the first step in a new and mutually-beneficial relationship.”