Busted: What Florida's union busters are up to | Sept. 2024 edition
A monthly round-up of reported activity by Florida's anti-union labor consultants, and any employers in Florida that hire them.
Florida is home to some of the most active anti-union labor consultants in the country. Such consultants, described by critics as “union busters,” are hired by employers to convince workers not to form or join a union. Some are attorneys, others are not.
More formally known as “persuaders” or just simply “consultants,” these consultants are hired to conduct union “risk” assessments (union vulnerability audits), train management how to talk down unions (without flagrantly violating federal law on this), and/or directly persuade employees “to exercise or not to exercise, or persuade employees as to the manner of exercising, the right to organize and bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing.”
Ground rules: Under federal law, persuaders are required to file reports with the federal Office of Labor Management Services when they enter into agreements with employers. These forms are known as LM-20s and LM-21s. When filled out correctly, they offer a snapshot of what persuaders are hired to do, and how much money they’re getting out of it. Employers are similarly required to file similar reports (LM-10s) annually, detailing how much they’ve spent on union busting or “persuader” activity.
LM-20’s (detailing a job) must be filed within 30 days of entering into an agreement with a company, while LM-21’s (disclosing total payment) must be filed within 90 days after the end of the filer’s fiscal year.
The idea behind these reporting requirements is to empower workers involved in an organizing drive with knowledge of any third-party their employer has brought in, and how much they’re paying them. Often, the going rate for working to maintain a union-free workplace is hundreds of dollars per hour, as you’ll see below.
Here’s what Florida’s union avoidance experts were up to this past month:
*Note: I’m considering releasing these twice a month, instead of just at the end/beginning of the month because 1) these are getting long 2) now that there are some folks filing their reports on time, as federally mandated, I believe it may be more important to get that information out in a timely manner. If you feel strongly one way or another, please let me know!
Three consultants affiliated with Labor Advisors LLC in Delray Beach — Joe Agraz, Daniel Bryan, and Katie Parry — were hired in August by the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas hotel to convince security guards and “lost and found” employees not to unionize with the International Union, Security, Police and Fire Professionals of America (SPFPA). The consultants were hired for the job through Raymond Rosenbach of the Illinois-based Government Resources Consultants of America, a firm also recently hired by the likes of Amazon, Stone Brewing, and Sysco. According to the NLRB, the security workers ultimately voted 34-82 against unionization, although a separate group of workers employed by the same hotel company — including receivers and runners in their warehouses — recently filed their own petition to join the Teamsters Local 986. It’s unclear how much the consultants were piad for their job — Rosenbach doesn’t specify in his report.
Juan Carlos Cervantes, a consultant also affiliated with Labor Advisors LLC, was hired in August by Baldor Specialty Foods to “inform and educate” warehouse drivers organizing with the Teamsters Local 500 in Philadelphia, PA. Cervantes was enlisted for the job (identified as “ongoing”) through Raymond Rosenbach with the Government Resources Consultants of America, based in Illinois, who also brought in Juan Cruz of the California-based outfit, Reconnect Labor Relations Consultants.
Going deeper: Baldor Specialty Foods, a distribution service, has faced off against the Teamsters before, and similarly hired an anti-union firm to thwart an organizing drive in 2015. During an organizing drive up in the Bronx, during the mid-aughts, the company reportedly posted signs that read, “Proud to Be Union Free” outside their headquarters. Union organizers responded with their own signs: “It’s Your Time to Organize — Yes We Can.”
Goodwill of Colorado in late August hired Nekeya Nunn, head of the Labor Pros firm in Orlando, to persuade their e-commerce associates in Colorado Springs not to unionize with the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 7. Two consultants Nunn enlisted for the job — Sarah Hirt and Josue Figueroa — were paid $75/hour to “educate employees,” according to reports filed by the pair. Meanwhile, Nunn reports that Goodwill agreed to pay her firm $3,750 per day. Generally, she charges $400+ an hour for her consulting work. If the $75 hourly rate is to be believed, maybe they have a discount for low-wage, union busting nonprofits? IDK. According to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), workers ultimately voted 42-59 against unionization in mid-September, but objections to the election results have been filed and the case is still open. I’ve reported extensively on the Labor Pros for Orlando Weekly, as a firm that has historically lagged in filing their disclosure reports, in violation of federal rules.
Luis Alvarez, a consultant based in Hollywood, filed an amended report with the feds this last month, disclosing a more accurate time-frame (and pay rate) for his recent gig for Sixt Rent-A-Car down at Miami International Airport. As I reported last month for Orlando Weekly, Alvarez was enlisted for the job through the Orlando-based Labor Pros. The job? To bust organizing activity among rental sales agents at the airport, who sought to organize with the Teamsters Local 769. The workers ultimately voted 12-19 against unionizing. Alvarez, in his amended report, shares that he was on the job from June 16, 2024 through July 25, 2024. Previously, he reported that the job only lasted through June 25.
Sean Lyles, an Orlando-based consultant who’s worked for the likes of vegetarian food manufacturer Amy’s Kitchen and carmaker Mercedes-Benz, belatedly filed a report this month disclosing a job for Westinghouse Energy Company in Hopkins, South Carolina. According to his report, submitted roughly seven months late, Lyles was hired to convince production and maintenance workers not to unionize with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. At the end of the day, the employees ultimately voted 246-379 against joining the IBEW, but they faced a tough fight. The employer reportedly hired at least half a dozen consultants (including Lyles) to “persuade” employees to vote against the union (including Wildine Pierre, a labor consultant based in Altamonte Springs near Orlando, plus her husband Daniel Barrett and likely relative Webs Pierre). Westinghouse hasn’t disclosed how much they paid these consultants, and they haven’t disclosed that information either.
“We were up against a lot,” Melissa Reyes, an organizer with IBEW, told the South Carolina Daily Gazette after the vote.
John Buress, a consultant affiliated with Labor Advisors LLC in Delray Beach, was hired through the Government Resources Consultants of America last month to convince delivery drivers, warehouse workers, and yard workers employed by Builders First Source not to unionize with the Teamsters Local 89 in Shelbysville, Kentucky. Keith Peraino, a right-wing consultant who heads the affiliated firm Eternity Souls LLC also in Delray Beach, was also involved. According to the union, workers ended up voting to join the Teamsters anyway, despite “egregious union busting tactics, many of which were highly illegal,” the union claimed. According to Buress, consultants billed the employer $150/hour for the job, which lasted about three weeks.
“Despite the Company’s disgusting behavior, the workers were sustained by an outpouring of Teamsters support, including fellow Builders FirstSource Teamsters from Locals 135 and 174 who reached out via videos and statements that encouraged Shelbyville employees to join our union,” the union wrote in a news release.
Webs Pierre, a labor consultant based in Altamonte Springs, was hired through the Nevada-based firm Quest Consulting last month to convince drivers employed by NFI Industries in Texas not to unionize with the Teamsters. Pierre was enlisted for the job alongside Kentucky-based consultant Daniel Block, who has worked with possible-relative Wildine Pierre (also of Altamonte Springs) in the past. I can’t find a National Labor Relations Board filing for this union drive, so it may have been in the very early stages, or preemptive. According to a report filed by Quest Consulting president Jessica Thomas, consultants were hired Aug. 12, 2024 to “teach” drivers about the “NLRB [National Labor Relations Board] process” and “[p]articularly the side of the NLRA that Unions don't provide employees.” Unclear to me what that’s supposed to mean. The employer agreed to pay consultants between $250 to $350 an hour for the job, according to Thomas, “including travel and expenses.”
Going deeper: Back in 2011, NFI Industries similarly hired a union buster affiliated with the firm Midwest Management Consultants for “purposes of remaining union free,” according to a financial disclosure report filed by the employer. NFI Industries reportedly paid the firm $31,288 for the job, which consisted of “Giving speeches, preparing written materials for distribution, and conducting meetings with employees and management.” The kicker? They didn’t file their mandatory disclosure report until 2014 — three years later than is required under federal law. Nice job!
Drink distributor Breakthru Beverage hired the Nevada-based union avoidance firm Action Resources in August at a daily rate of $3,750/hour per consultant to convince delivery drivers in Tampa, Orlando, Pensacola, Jacksonville, Fort Myers, and Tallahassee not to unionize with the Teamsters. They failed, for the record. Action Resources, a firm also recently hired to (unsuccessfully) obstruct an organizing drive in Orlando involving the Teamsters, enlisted six consultants for the job, including Orlando-based consultant Chris Catam of Millennium Labor Consulting Solutions, LLC and former Teamsters organizer Angel Cornejo of Pinnacle Labor Relations.
Going deeper: Emma Medina, another consultant hired for the job, was similarly dispatched by Action Resources to California earlier this year to bust a Breakthru Beverages organizing drive there, too. The results of that election — a loss for the union — have been contested.
“I know firsthand the difference between a union and nonunion job,” said Jose Miranda, a Breakthru driver in Orlando, and a member of Teamsters Local 385 in a statement. “Before Breakthru, I was a Teamster. The Teamsters have always been like a second family to me. When times got tough, it became clear that organizing was the only way forward.”
Wildine Pierre, a labor consultant affiliated with Bridge Labor Solutions in Altamonte Springs, teamed up with CA-based consultant Michael Penn of the Crossroads Group Labor Relations Consultants at an hourly rate of $450 in August to counter an organizing drive by Burke Rehabilitation Hospital employees in New York, who sought to unionize with 1199SEIU. According to the NLRB, the case is still open. Records show staff first filed a petition to unionize in May, but the case was closed. Penn was reportedly around when that happened, too.
Russell “Russ” Brown of RoadWarrior Productions in Satellite Beach last month dispatched three labor consultants — including former Orlando-based Teamsters official Roger Allain, Monica Meija of Casselberry and Tennessee-based consultant Edward Hinkle — to counter a bid by DPS associates at Amazon’s DAX5 facility in California to unionize with the Teamsters. Brown, just a couple of weeks later, also filed a report disclosing an agreement with Amazon to target an organizing drive among DPS associates at Amazon’s DAS7 facility in Salem, MA (using a separate crew of four anti-union consultants). In a letter written to Amazon program manager Tiffany Blagmon, filed with the DOL, Brown writes, “We are grateful for the opportunities that Amazon has given to us and will strive to exceed your expectations in both service and fiscal responsibility.” Indeed, Brown has been hired by Amazon before, along with other anti-union firms based in Central Florida. Brown charges $475/hour or $3,800 per day, per consultant.
Luisa Perez, a labor consultant from Punta Gorda, was enlisted by Texas-based liquor chain Spec’s in late August to preemptively convince their employees in Austin, El Paso, Ft. Worth, Houston, Plano, and San Antonio, Texas that they don’t need a union. I say preemptively because Perez was similarly hired by Spec’s recently to bust an organizing drive among Spec’s delivery drivers in Dallas, who ultimately voted to join the Teamsters Local 745. This latest report filed by Perez clarifies that “no petition” has been filed (yet?). Perez was hired for this latest preemptive job through right-wing union buster Peter List, along with Arizona-based consultant Simon Jara and Justin Shoemaker of South Carolina. Spec’s has agreed to pay List’s firm $3,7,50 per day, per consultant, “plus actual and reasonable expenses.” According to Perez’s report, her cut is $2,812.50 per day.
List’s firm, Logic Labor Relations, was also hired (again) by Sysco South Florida to convince cycle counters, financial associates, and other employees in Medley not to unionize with the Teamsters Local 769. List contracted California-based consultant Oscar Wilmington for the job, records show. Although the workers’ union election has occurred, the results haven’t been publicly posted by the NLRB and the union hasn’t shared results either. Other Sysco employees in Medley already unionized with Local 769 in 2019, despite what might have involved an encounter with List then, too. Records show List’s firm was paid $146,184 to conduct anti-union captive audience meetings with Sysco employees in Key West, Medley, and Auburndale around that time. List has, in fact, been hired multiple times in the past by Sysco, including to bust an organizing drive in Grand Rapids, MI earlier this year and an organizing drive in Louisville, KY last year.
Johan Pena, an anti-union labor consultant from Miami, was hired through the Labor Relations Institute — along with four other consultants — to convince production and maintenance workers employed by Canadian Solar in Mesquite, Texas not to unionize with the United Steelworkers. Phil Wilson, president of LRI, reports that consultants held “voluntary” meetings with employees (generally, these anti-union meetings are made mandatory) and notes that this campaign is “pre-petition,” meaning workers haven’t filed a petition for an election with the NLRB. Canadian Solar has agreed to pay LRI a rate of $425 per hour, “plus reasonable travel expenses,” per Wilson’s report. In their written agreement, also submitted to the feds, Wilson writes that union campaigns “can be highly emotional and disruptive,” adding that “Our number one priority is to leave your company and your workforce better than how we found it.”
That’s it for this month. Do you like this round-up? Do you have thoughts or feedback? Drop a comment below, and share with friends, coworkers and fellow troublemakers.