Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, LABOR—ARBITRATION—N.D. Ill.: Employer must pay fines awarded to union after its failure to comply with decision of grievance committee, (Dec 5, 2025)

By Ronald Miller, J.D.

The Seventh Circuit has held that “[a] failure to comply with a joint committee award is a breach of a federal labor contract subject to section 301 jurisdiction.”

A federal district court in Illinois granted a union’s summary judgment motion, determining that the employer owed fines that had been awarded by a grievance committee as a result of allegations that it had violated contractual provisions regarding employees’ membership in the union and a subcontracting provision. Contrary to the employer’s contention, the court determined that the grievance committee’s decision did, in fact, arise out of a violation of the CBA between the employer and the union and it derived its remedy from the agreement. Accordingly, the employer was to pay the amounts awarded by the grievance committee (The Construction and General Laborers’ District Council of Chicago and Vicinity v. Global Builders & Developers Inc., No. 24 C 9706 (N.D. Ill. Dec. 4, 2025)).

The employer is a construction company operating in Chicago, Illinois. On November 10, 2020, Global Builders, Inc., entered into an agreement to act as general contractor of a residential apartment construction project in Chicago (the project). On March 4, 2022, the general contractor hired the employer to provide one union laborer for the project to help with cleanup on the construction site, including vacuuming, mopping, and cleaning windows.

On that same day, the employer signed an agreement with a local union affiliated with the Laborers’ union. The union has a collective bargaining agreement with the Chicago Area Independent Contractors Association, and the employer was bound to the union’s CBA.

Grievance committee. The CBA provides that “any dispute concerning the interpretation or application of this Agreement between an Employer and the Union shall be adjusted by the particular Employer and Union, in the first instance.... In the event that the matter is not settled, the Union may file a written grievance, which shall be submitted to a Joint Grievance Committee.” The grievance committee’s resolution of a grievance is “final and binding.” If the grievance committee is deadlocked on disposition of the grievance, the matter is referred to arbitration.

Non-union labor. On July 27, 2022, the local union filed a grievance alleging that the employer violated the CBA by using non-union labor. Relevant contractual provisions require all new employees to join the union and remain members in good standing as a condition of continued employment. On October 10, 2022, the local union filed an additional grievance asserting that the employer violated the CBA by subcontracting to a non-signatory company. Under that provision, the employer signatory agrees it will only contract or subcontract work covered by the CBA to persons, firms, and corporations that are signatories to the CBA.

Grievance award. The grievance committee upheld the grievances in their entirety and instructed the employer to pay $334.33 to the union’s pension and welfare fund pursuant to a fringe benefit audit and provide the grievance committee with the construction contract for final cleaning on the project.

The letter further stated that if the documents were not provided to the grievance committee by December 29, 2023, the employer was to pay $115,000 to the union’s charitable foundation, in addition to 50 percent liquidated damages, which totaled $57,500.

The employer paid $334.33 pursuant to the fringe benefit audit, but it did not provide the documents, nor did it pay the amounts the letter called for if the documents were not produced. The employer insisted that the union, not the employer, should provide documents to prove its claims, and did not file a lawsuit challenging the validity of the award.

Court jurisdiction. The employer unsuccessfully insisted that the court cannot enforce the award against it because it lacked subject matter jurisdiction where the Grievance Committee’s decision was not final, and because the statute of limitations on challenges to Grievance Committee awards has not yet begun running.

According to the employer, the grievance committee’s decision did not arise out of a violation of the CBA between the employer and the union and does not derive its remedy from the agreement. However, the Seventh Circuit has held that “[a] failure to comply with a joint committee award is a breach of a federal labor contract subject to section 301 jurisdiction.” A failure to comply with the Grievance Committee’s award is precisely what the Union alleges here, landing this action squarely within the court’s jurisdiction under § 301 of the LMRA.

Grievances. Here, the parties agree that the agreement binds the employer to the union’s CBA. They also agree that the CBA says that if an employer and the Union cannot settle “any dispute concerning the interpretation or application of this Agreement... the Union may file a written grievance, which shall be submitted to a Joint Grievance Committee.”

However, the employer argued that the grievances (alleged violations of the CBA) were not related to the CBA because it was not the party who committed the violations, and it did not agree to arbitrate the issues addressed in the documents the grievance committee calls for as a remedy. By signing the agreement, the employer agreed to arbitrate the union’s grievances concerning violations of the CBA. Accordingly, the court had jurisdiction to enforce the resulting award.

Finality of award. A grievance committee award must be “final and binding” for a court to have jurisdiction to enforce it. An award is final when “an arbitrator believes the assignment is completed[.]” Here, the employer argued that the grievance committee’s decision was not final and binding because it did not decide whether the employer had violated the CBA.

The Union submitted affidavits from the four members of the grievance committee affirming they believed and intended that their decision and award be final and binding. Accordingly, the award was final and binding, and the court may enforce it.

Challenges to enforceability. Finally, the court may enforce the grievance committee’s award because the employer’s challenge to the award via its affirmative defenses was impermissible and precluded by the statute of limitations on such challenges.

First, the employer is not attempting to vacate the grievance committee’s award outright but is instead raising affirmative defenses in response to the union’s suit against it to enforce the award. This is an impermissible maneuver in the Seventh Circuit.

Statute of limitations. Second, the statute of limitations on challenges to the award has long since run. The applicable state statute is Illinois’s version of the Uniform Arbitration Act, which provides a 90-day statute of limitations to challenge the validity of an arbitration award. The 90-day limit is rigid. Further, the statute of limitations applies equally to a grievance committee decision as it would to an arbitration decision. The court takes judicial notice that the statute of limitations would have run by March 13, 2024.

The statute of limitations began running when the employer received the letter on December 14, 2023. The issues submitted to the grievance committee were claimed violations of the CBA. The documents were a remedy devised by the grievance committee after it evaluated the violations, and the grievance committee’s choice of remedy was not subject to the court’s review.

Accordingly, the union’s motion for summary judgment was granted; the employer’s motion was denied.

The case is No. 24 C 9706.

Judge: Lefkow, J.

Attorneys: Robert E. Bloch (Auerbach & Yokich) for The Construction and General Laborers’ District Council of Chicago and Vicinity. Melissa D. Sobota (Franczek P.C.) for Global Builders & Developers Inc.

Companies: The Construction and General Laborers’ District Council of Chicago and Vicinity; Global Builders & Developers Inc.

Cases: Labor Arbitration ContractClaims UnionsMembers PensionBenefitPlans RemediesDamages Procedure IllinoisNews