Sources: National Labor Relations Board; CP staff
The National Labor Relations Board Region 25 office has dismissed a US Brick Holdings LLC employee’s petition for a vote among 30-plus production or fleet team members—all based at a Mooresville, Ind. plant and mine—to maintain or decertify Teamsters Local 135 as their collective bargaining representative. The petition was submitted five weeks after US Brick acquired the operation from General Shale Brick, which had agreements with Teamsters 135, Indianapolis, and a prior local for decades.
Backed by Charleston, S.C.-based US Brick, the Mooresville plant petitioner questioned NLRB “successor-bar doctrine” applicability to the pursuit of a decertification vote under the routine six- to 12-month window allowed for unions to negotiate contracts with new company owners. Dismissing the petition, Regional Director Patricia Nachand cites the narrow terms for challenging collective bargaining agreements and incumbent union recognition when a business changes hands. Her decision does not appear to prevent a potential decertification vote later this year.
Johnson City, Tenn.-based General Shale sold the Mooresville plant in a November 2021 transaction settling a U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division complaint stemming from the producer’s merger with Meridian Brick, Alpharetta, Ga. The transaction settled the complaint and netted US Brick a combination of General Shale and Meridian assets: Indiana, Alabama and Tennessee clay brick production facilities and deposits, plus 14 masonry distribution yards or showrooms in the Midwest and Southeast.
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