Regis accused of breaking federal labor laws

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) says it believes that Edina-based Regis Corp. violated federal labor laws when it asked salon employees to make a written pledge not to sign union authorization cards in the future.

The labor board's regional office in Minneapolis, which issued the complaint late Friday, also took issue with a DVD in which it said Regis CEO Paul Finkelstein "threatened ... it would close salons if employees selected a union to represent them" and that those who signed union authorization cards or supported a union "would be blacklisted in the industry."

Regis placed posters at salons "exhorting employees not to sign union authorization cards and to call an information hotline if they observed any union activity by other employees," according to the complaint.

A Regis spokeswoman said Monday that the company would not comment. Finkelstein told the Star Tribune in February, after employees in four states had filed unfair labor complaints, that the company intended to fight the charges, potentially to the Supreme Court.

Regis Corp. is the world's largest salon operator, with 12,700 salons, beauty schools and hair restoration centers worldwide under such banners as Regis, Supercuts, Cost Cutters, MasterCuts and Hair Club for Men and Women.

The complaint is akin to a probable cause charge. A hearing before an administrative law judge to determine whether Regis has violated federal law likely will be scheduled for next year.

That ruling can be appealed to the NLRB's national office in Washington, D.C., and to a U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Separately, the Tampa regional office of the National Labor Relations Board is investigating complaints by two employees who say they were wrongfully terminated for refusing to sign the pledge.

Regis created the pledge in August 2009 as Congress was discussing the Employee Free Choice Act. The legislation, which since has been put on the back burner, would have made it easier to form unions in part because it eliminated a secret ballot -- a current requirement that unions say is a secondary hurdle after a majority of workers already have expressed their wish to form a union.

Finkelstein argued that the document fortified workers' ability to vote in a secret election, which he said "is an absolute personal right."

The NLRB sees it differently.

"My view is that the law's pretty clear, and that Regis has violated the National Labor Relations Act," said Marlin Osthus, regional director of the Minneapolis NLRB office. "What's unusual and somewhat egregious is the fact that it has affected so many employees and so many locations across the country."

Congress passed the law in 1935 to protect the rights of employees to organize and determine whether to have a union as their collective bargaining representative.

Tompkins Workers' Center director Pete Meyers, which filed unfair labor practices on behalf of two salon workers in Ithaca, N.Y., heralded the NLRB's action.

"Many workers don't really know what it means to organize a union," he said. "This is going to educate workers around the country."

The labor board wants Regis to destroy the signed agreements, remove the posters and produce a new DVD for employees. It also may seek an injunction to force Regis to stop presenting its "protection of secret vote agreement."