
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, September 6, 1995                   TAG: 9509060139
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

NLRB WRINGS OUT TOWEL MAKER, FINDS ACTS 'OUTRAGEOUS'

Fieldcrest Cannon Inc. engaged in unfair labor practices ``so numerous, pervasive and outrageous'' while battling union organizers in 1991 that it must provide sweeping remedies, the National Labor Relations Board has ruled.

The remedies include requiring a Fieldcrest Cannon vice president to read aloud an NLRB cease-and-desist notice in English and Spanish at the company's plants in four states or stand by while an NLRB representative reads it, the labor agency said.

Fieldcrest Cannon, a towel maker based in Eden, N.C., said it would appeal. The company operates a towel mill in Henry County.

The Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees announced the NLRB action Tuesday. The order was issued Aug. 25 and recorded Aug. 29.

The company also must pay back wages to unionized workers who were denied a 5.5 percent raise that nonunion workers got in 1991. The back wages total about $2 million, the union said.

``Every time Fieldcrest Cannon appeals this case, a new set of judges or board members finds a stronger punishment for them. Eventually, the company is going to have to face the fact its horrible treatment of employees disgusts everyone who learns about it. It's time to put the back-pay money in the workers' hands where it belongs,'' said Bruce Raynor, the union's southern regional director in Atlanta.

Fieldcrest Cannon also must reinstate 13 workers fired for their union activities and allow a new union-representation election. The decision allows union organizers into nonunion plants to discuss membership.

The company may ask the NLRB to reconsider, or it can file a lawsuit with a federal appeals court asking that the order be changed, said John Toner, the board's acting executive secretary.

O.L. Raines Jr., the vice president of human relations whom the NLRB specified must attend readings of its order, said:

``The company has just received and is in the process of reviewing in detail the NLRB's recent decision. We obviously do not feel that justice has been done, and it does appear certain that the company will appeal.''

The ruling stems from a bitter organizing campaign by the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union. The union lost an employee vote in August 1991 by 199 votes out of more than 6,000 ballots cast. The NLRB said the company was guilty of intimidation, coercion and harassment of employees.

The Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees succeeded the ACTWU, which filed the NLRB complaint.

The battle involved nonunion Fieldcrest Cannon plants in Kannapolis and Concord, N.C. The NLRB's order for remedies also include unionized plants in Fieldale, Va.; Phenix City, Ala.; and Columbus, Ga.

The NLRB agreed a fair election on union representation was made impossible because of efforts to paint a vote in favor of ACTWU as a step toward closed plants and lost jobs.

by CNB