Washington State House of Representatives Office of Program Research | BILL ANALYSIS |
Labor & Workplace Standards Committee |
ESB 6229
This analysis was prepared by non-partisan legislative staff for the use of legislative members in their deliberations. This analysis is not a part of the legislation nor does it constitute a statement of legislative intent. |
Brief Description: Requiring employers to provide exclusive bargaining representatives reasonable access to new employees for the purposes of presenting information about their exclusive bargaining representative.
Sponsors: Senators Van De Wege, Chase, Conway, Wellman, Hasegawa, Saldaña, Keiser, Hunt and Kuderer.
Brief Summary of Engrossed Bill |
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Hearing Date: 2/19/18
Staff: Trudes Tango (786-7384).
Background:
Some existing collective bargaining agreements between public sector employers and employees have provisions that allow a union representative time to make a presentation to new employees at new employee orientations. Generally, new employee access provisions can be bargained for in the collective bargaining process and the agreement can specify how much time a union representative has and when and where the presentation to new employees must take place.
Last year, California passed legislation that, among other things, requires public sector employers to provide union representatives access to the new employee orientations for the purposes of communicating the rights and obligations created by the contract and the role of the union representative.
Summary of Bill:
Public employers must provide the exclusive bargaining representative reasonable access to new employees of the bargaining unit for the purposes of presenting information about their exclusive bargaining representative to the new employee. The presentation may occur during a new employee orientation provided by the employer, or at another time agreed to by the employer and the exclusive bargaining representative.
No employee may be mandated to attend the meetings or presentations by the exclusive bargaining representative.
"Reasonable access" means: (1) the access to the new employee occurs within 90 days of the employee's start date within the bargaining unit; (2) the access is for no less than 30 minutes; and (3) the access occurs during the new employee's regular work hours at the employee's regular worksite, or at a location agreed to by the employer and the exclusive bargaining representative.
An employer is not prohibited from agreeing to longer or more frequent access, but in no case may an employer agree to less access than required under the act.
The language regarding reasonable access is added to the statutes governing: academic personnel in community and technical colleges; educational employees of school districts; faculty of public four-year institutions of higher education; state employees covered by the civil service laws; ferry workers; certain symphony musicians; and employees of local governments and certain state employees covered by the Public Employees' Collective Bargaining Act.
Appropriation: None.
Fiscal Note: Available.
Effective Date: The bill takes effect 90 days after adjournment of the session in which the bill is passed.