Two years ago, an employee at a San Diego-area childrens' hospital filed a union decertification petition to eject an unwanted SEIU local. Instead of submitting to a formal decertification election, SEIU union officials filed a series of frivolous "blocking charges" in an attempt to indefinitely delay any decision.

After years of legal wrangling, however, the SEIU's charges were finally resolved. But rather than face a union decertification election, SEIU officials opted to withdraw from the bargaining unit, knowing full well that they'd lose employees' votes by a wide margin.

This is the paradox of union "representation": instead of allowing themselves to be held accountable to workers through a secret ballot election, SEIU lawyers took advantage of a few loopholes to stall the entire process -- when that ultimately failed, the union bosses finally took a hike. Does anyone think these cynical antics resulted from a sincere desire to represent workers' interests?

Here's a copy of the union's letter [1] (.pdf) disowning any interest in retaining its monopoly bargaining privileges at the hospital. Here's the National Labor Relations Board's decision [2] (.pdf) formally revoking the union's workplace authority. The San Diego Tribune also featured a decent article [3] on the union's decision to withdraw from the hospital.