Privacy Issues in the Community College Workplace

In California, employers should also note that California Labor Code sections 232 and 232.5 prohibits employers from taking adverse actions against employees for disclosing the amount of their wages and working conditions. Accordingly, we recommend that employers consider the context of employee speech in social media.

LCW Practice Advisor

In Purple Communications, Inc. v. Communications Workers of America, AFL-CIO , the NLRB determined that employees who have been given access to an employer’s email system in the course of their work are entitled to use system to engage in Section 7 activities during non- working hours. 511 An employer can rebut this presumption by showing that special circumstances make the ban necessary to maintain production or discipline. 512 An employer may also institute controls to the extent the controls are necessary to maintain production or discipline and the controls are applied uniformly and consistently enforced. 513 In a report from the Acting General Counsel of the NLRB dated August 18, 2011 514 , the Acting General Counsel found the following were concerted protected activities: a Facebook discussion between 5 coworkers about their job performance and workload; employee negative remarks about a supervisor who refused her request for union representation during an investigatory interview ( NLRB v. Hispanics United of Buffalo (New York) 515 ) ; employee criticism and concerns about food at a sales events because it could affect his commission ( NLRB v. Knauz BWM 516 ); and an employee postings about employer tax withholding practices. On the other hand, the NLRB has noted that speech involving individual gripes or “unprofessional and inappropriate tweets” that did not involve concerted activity was not protected by the NLRA. 517 In two 2017 cases involving Butler Medical Transport LLC, the NLRB made a distinction between comments about conditions that are of mutual concern to employees and posts that are “maliciously untrue and made with the knowledge that they are false.” 518 In the case of the later, the employer was able to show that at the time the employee posted his complaint about his work vehicle breaking down, the employee was in private vehicle and not a Butler ambulance. 519 The ALJ concluded that an employee’s public criticism of his/her employer loses its protection under the Act if the statements are maliciously untrue even if the statements might have otherwise had protection under the Act. 520 The NLRB has recognized the absence of precedent in cases involving “employer rules prohibiting, or disciplining employees for engaging in, protected concerted activity using social media, such as Facebook or Twitter,” and that this absence of clear guidelines may create inconsistent results. 521 Agencies should therefore proceed with caution before disciplining employees for on-line comments.

Privacy Issues in the Community College Workplace ©2021 (c) Liebert Cassidy Whitmore 169