It's Jim. Thanks.
Here's what stooges say. Joe was at the count. When the board agent made the announcement that the ballots would be impounded, Joe offered to w/d the request for review if the board would count the ballots that night. The motivation was simple, according to the "stooges": Fedex is confident of a 3 to 1 margin of victory in PKB, and they wanted that victory to influence the remaining undecideds in CRW the next day. This is the only reason they made the offer.
The board agent made a call to her boss, who said no. Case closed. The Board agent explained to those in the room that the reason for impounding the ballots was if in case the board changed it's mind (no chance of that) and allowed the dock to vote, then the dock voters (1 dock employee I think) might not be secret. They impound so that he could vote at a later date and get mixed in with the other impounded votes, maintaining his anonymity. Makes sense! Why the Board didn't take Fedex up on their offer to W/D their request for review is anyones guess. You'd think they'd be happy to get it off of their plate and bring the election to closure.
Of course, if they had opened the ballots that night, nothing would have been cancelled. No prohibition or anything different would have happened. There is no "we tricked you, HAHA!" clause in the NLRA that would have been triggered. And if it was a trick, then you'd think the union would have spoke up. The votes would have been known, and we wouldn't have to have this discussion.
Now, The Board has offered to open the CRW ballots this coming Wednesday before the CKB vote on Thursday. Fedex said YES PLEASE. They believe they also have a victory there also, which they believe will help influence the remaining CKB undecideds. Still waiting for a response from the union. If they think won the CRW election, they'd jump at the chance to get the results out before Thursday, don't you think?
That's what I hear.