Thomas Goonan Named Director in Region 4 (Philadelphia)

Washington, D.C. - National Labor Relations Board Chairman John F. Ring and General Counsel Peter B. Robb announced today the appointment of Thomas Goonan to serve as Regional Director for the Agency’s Region 4 Office in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 

Region 4 is responsible for conducting elections, investigating unfair labor practice charges, and protecting the right of workers to act collectively to improve their wages and working conditions in parts of Pennsylvania, Delaware and New Jersey. Mr. Goonan succeeds former Regional Director Dennis Walsh, who retired in February 2020.

Mr. Goonan has a record of over 30 years of U.S. Government service. Mr. Goonan has served since May 2019 as the General Counsel of the Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB), an independent, scientific Executive Branch agency that investigates the causes of chemical accidents at industrial facilities located throughout the United States. He is a 30-year civilian and military employee of the US Army, including four years active duty in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps. Before joining the CSB, Mr. Goonan served since 2015 as Chief Counsel of the Army’s Natick Soldier Legal Office in Natick, Massachusetts, and prior to that as the Chief Counsel of the Army’s 13,000 employee Research, Development and Engineering Command located at Maryland’s Aberdeen Proving Ground. 

Mr. Goonan graduated magna cum laude in 1979 from Norwich University, earned his JD from New England School of Law in 1983, and received advanced degrees from the Johns Hopkins University in 1986 and the Army War College in 2002. He has taught both labor law and labor relations as an adjunct instructor at the University of Maryland’s University College and at Florida Institute of Technology. 

Established in 1935, the National Labor Relations Board is an independent federal agency that protects employees and employers, and unions from unfair labor practices and protects the right of private sector employees to join together, with or without a union, to improve wages, benefits and working conditions. The NLRB conducts hundreds of workplace elections and investigates thousands of unfair labor practice charges each year.