NYT: A Dispute Over Unionizing at Montana Hair Salons

[Heidi]

Published: August 29, 2009

Keri Gorder, until recently the manager of a hair salon in Great Falls, Mont., said she was surprised last month by a document that her company wanted stylists to sign.

Ms. Gorder said the salon’s parent company, the Regis Corporation, had urged the four stylists at her salon, Cost Cutters, to sign a document that would seemingly nullify any future support they showed for unionization.

Labor leaders in Montana accuse the company of seeking to take away the stylists’ right to form a union. But Regis says the document merely seeks to ensure that workers choose unions through a secret-ballot election — at a time when unions are pushing legislation in Congress that would make it easy to bypass secret ballots.

The document the stylists at several Montana salons were urged to sign said they were agreeing to revoke any future signature they put on a pro-union card that could be counted as showing support for unionizing.

“I thought it was taking our right away before we ever exercised that right,” Ms. Gorder said.

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