Relating to employee organization elections administered by the public employment relations board and including effective date and applicability provisions

15, relating to elections for employee organizations representing public employee collective bargaining units pursuant to Code chapter 20. The bill strikes statutory changes made by 2017 Iowa Acts, ch. (House File 291), and restores statutory language in effect prior to the enactment of 2017 Iowa Acts, ch. (House File 291). The bill eliminates language providing for retention and recertification elections. The bill requires the public employment relations board to cancel any such elections scheduled or in process. The bill requires the board to consider a petition for certification of an employee organization as the exclusive representative of a bargaining unit for which an employee organization was not retained and recertified as the exclusive representative of that bargaining unit regardless of the amount of time that has elapsed since the retention and recertification election, notwithstanding prior requirements prohibiting such consideration for two years. The bill provides that the outcome of a certification or decertification election is determined by a majority vote of the members of the bargaining unit voting, rather than the total membership of the bargaining unit. The bill provides for a runoff election if none of the choices on the ballot in a certification election receives a majority vote of the members of the bargaining unit voting. The bill lowers the required percentage of support from employees in a bargaining unit required for an employee organization that did not submit a petition for certification as the exclusive bargaining representative of a bargaining unit to be listed on the ballot for a certification election from percent to percent. The bill strikes language prohibiting the board from considering a petition for certification as the exclusive bargaining representative of a bargaining unit unless a period of two years has elapsed from the date of the last certification election in which an employee organization was not certified as the exclusive representative of that bargaining unit or of the last decertification election in which an employee organization was decertified as the exclusive representative of that bargaining unit. The bill prohibits the board from considering a petition for certification as the exclusive bargaining representative of a bargaining unit for one year after the employee organization is not certified in a certification election. The bill makes additional changes relating to the scheduling of decertification elections. The bill makes conforming changes.15 on and after the effective date of the bill.