Region 28 successfully obtained Order against David Saxe Productions and V Theater Group to reinstate fired employees and open and count their ballots

This week, the National Labor Relations Board issued a Decision, Order, and Direction finding that David Saxe Productions, LLC and V Theater Group, LLC engaged in egregious and pervasive unfair labor practices to prevent their employees from voting for International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and Moving Picture Technicians, Artists, and Allied Crafts of the United States and Canada (IATSE), Local 720, AFL-CIO to represent them. 

The NLRB found that David Saxe Productions and V Theater Group—which jointly produce live Las Vegas shows—illegally fired 10 employees, otherwise retaliated against other employees, gave employees a wage increase, and threatened and coercively interrogated employees in an attempt to extinguish a campaign by IATSE, Local 720 to represent the companies.

The NLRB’s Order requires David Saxe Productions and V Theater Group to reinstate the 10 illegally fired employees and pay them backpay, with interest, and requires that the determinative ballots that seven illegally fired employees cast in an NLRB election be opened and counted. 

The NLRB also ordered “enhanced remedies” due to the “egregious and pervasive” nature of the conduct of David Saxe Productions and V Theater Group and those companies’ “proclivity to violate the Act.”  These enhanced remedies include posting of a notice to employees and an explanation of employees’ rights; reading of the notice and explanation of rights to employees by, or in the presence of, a high-ranking management official; and a broad cease-and-desist order prohibiting the respondents from interfering with, restraining, or coercing employees in the exercise of their rights under Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act in any manner. 

“The National Labor Relations Act grants workers a right to act collectively to improve their workplace,” said the NLRB’s Acting General Counsel Peter Sung Ohr. “Employers should respect their workers’ rights and allow them to exercise their rights freely.”

Judge Andrew Gordon of the United States District Court for the District of Nevada previously issued an immediate interim injunction requiring David Saxe Productions and V Theater Group, among other things, to cease and desist from discriminating against employees because of their union activities and to offer reinstatement to the 10 illegally fired employees while the case was pending before the NLRB.

The NLRB’s Decision, Order, and Direction largely adopted a decision issued by Administrative Law Judge Mara-Louise Anzalone based on a complaint issued by Cornele A. Overstreet, Regional Director of Region 28 of the NLRB. NLRB Field Attorneys Sara Demirok and Rodolfo Martinez litigated the case be before the NLRB, the Administrative Law Judge, and the District of Nevada.

Established in 1935, the National Labor Relations Board is an independent federal agency that protects employees, 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.