EMPLOYER REFUSAL TO BARGAIN IN GOOD FAITH; UNILATERAL CHANGE (FOR NEGOT OF SPECIFIC SUBJECTS, SEE SEC 1000, SCOPE OF REPRESENTATION) – Change In Policy

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The Board found the employer changed the status quo when it sought an order from the superior court to deny union representatives access to picket, parade, march, stand, sit, walk, or otherwise be present in areas inside or outside of the employer’s facilities, other than the employee parking lot. The record established a unilateral change as both a change in established past practice and a newly created policy or application or enforcement of existing policy in a new way. In the past the unions regularly engaged in protected conduct in the very areas the employer now insisted such activities were disallowed. This past practice was sufficiently “regular and consistent” (or alternately “historic and accepted”) to constitute an established practice. (See Oakland Unified School District (2023) PERB Decision No. 2875, p. 13; Pittsburg Unified School District (2022) PERB Decision No. 2833, p. 12.) Moreover, the employer also created a new policy or applied or enforced policy in a new way when it for the first time sought to block the Unions from non-patient areas. (pp. 37-41.)