> The article reports . . . and that workers who were not
> at boss-approved sites who approached SEIU for representation would
> be rebuffed.
This is a pretty standard feature of a private election agreement between a union and an employer, and not necessarily a bad thing. The boss agrees not to fight union drives at a number of worksites, and the union agrees for some specified period not to run contested NLRB elections at other worksites. The sad fact is that it is very hard for workers to win a contested board election given today's labor laws, and any strategy that relies upon running multiple contested NLRB elections is a losing strategy in terms of building worker power and density in a given geography so that contracts can begin to bring up standards and working conditions.
Obviously, such agreements are subject to abuse. At a union I worked at prior to coming to SEIU, there was an agreement between the union and a major employer with scores of non-union plants across the country to let the union run an uncontested election each year. This agreement was never going to lead to complete unionization of the company, let alone the industry. Moreover, the company tended to crush the union in each round of bargaining at the unionized facilities. The question to ask: is the private election agreement a step in building power, eventually taking a company or an industry in a given market 100% union, with the goal of raising standards and working conditions, or is it merely a way to buy off the union.