The Hill News

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) may be on the brink of making a major change in national labor policy without resorting to the basic strictures of the Administrative Procedures Act (APA), which requires federal agencies to adhere to certain standards when issuing new regulations, including conducting cost benefit assessments and providing the public notice and a full and fair opportunity to comment. 

Specifically, the Board has announced its intent to reconsider the standards that have governed for decades what constitutes an appropriate unit for purposes of union representation and collective bargaining. The Board, over a strident dissent by the lone Republican member, has done so in the context of adjudicating a single case, one in which no party requested such a sweeping review of existing law. The Board’s actions are questionable both as a matter of substantive policy and administrative procedure, and smack of an effort to achieve through age! ncy fiat radical statutory changes Congress has declined to enact. 

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