By Braden Campbell

Law360 (March 16, 2020, 11:10 AM EDT ) The National Labor Relations Board on Monday told most of its employees to telework for the rest of the month after a handful of workers were exposed to the coronavirus, including an attorney in the agency field staffers' union who had criticized the board's response to the pandemic.

The board will maintain "minimal staffing" in its regional offices — which will be open from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on weekdays and continue to send and receive mail — but has told most workers to telework until "at least April 1," it said Monday. The board previously shut down its Washington, D.C., headquarters after a worker there had "close contact" with someone who tested positive for the coronavirus.

The announcement comes after the board said Sunday that it had closed its Manhattan, Detroit and Chicago offices and told employees to telework indefinitely following the "possible COVID-19 exposures" of a worker in each office. Those offices will remain closed, the board said.

"All employees, other than minimal staffing, as needed to handle mail, have been directed to telework," the agency said.

National Labor Relations Board Local 2 President Michael Bilik in Manhattan told Law360 on Monday he was among the exposed agency workers. He said flu-like symptoms hit him "like a freight train" at the end of last week, much of which he had spent criticizing the agency's response to the coronavirus.

This response included a midweek directive from the board's top attorney to the agency's regional officials telling them not to expand telework policies, after the director of the Seattle office gave workers more leeway to work remotely, Bilik said.

"The agency should set a national framework to adapt to crises through bargaining with the national union, and certainly not by unilaterally rescinding delegation of authority to regional directors to act in an emergency to protect the staff and public," Bilik told Law360 in an email.

Asked for comment on Bilik's accusations, an NLRB spokesperson said the agency centralized coronavirus decisionmaking in its Washington, D.C., office last week.

Bilik's dispute with agency brass concerns regional officials' leeway to grant "liberal telework" in times of crisis. The union's collective bargaining agreement, which covers certain workers in the agency's nationwide network of field offices, provides for union members to work remotely a few days per pay period if they check certain boxes, Bilik said. It also gives the directors of the board's regional offices discretion to let workers telework full-time in emergencies, he said.

Seattle Regional Director Ronald Hooks on March 2 said workers who had "a valid telework agreement" and were concerned about travel could work remotely outside their usual allotment, according to an image of an email provided to Law360. But in a March 10 email, Hooks rescinded this policy effective March 13, citing "a directive from the Division of Operations-Management" in Washington, D.C., according to another image provided to Law360.

Bilik had been agitating for Manhattan office head Jack Walsh to expand telework in his office before the Division of Operations-Management, which is part of the Office of the General Counsel, issued its directive, he said. Afterwards, he sent General Counsel Peter Robb an email criticizing the move.

"We are pleading that you temporarily instruct Operations to defer to local health officials, and grant liberal telework for the NYC offices, short of additional guidance and agreement," Bilik wrote.

The other federal labor agencies are also grappling with the crisis. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission told all workers in its Washington, D.C., headquarters and field office to work remotely last week after an HQ employee "exhibited symptoms consistent with coronavirus," according to an update posted to its website. The agency had previously told staff in offices across the country to take in discrimination complaints by phone to limit face-to-face contact.

A U.S. Department of Labor spokesperson told Law360 on Monday that agency workers in the Washington, D.C., area "may telework to the extent possible" through Friday, and that regional offices "are implementing telework with approval as needed."

--Editing by Marygrace Murphy.

Update: This story has been updated with additional information.

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