Westerly - A variety of pestilence has been visited on the old Bradford Dyeing Association plant in recent years, including a spectacular 2007 fire, last year's flood and the vagaries of U.S. Department of Defense budgets.

But the factory in the Bradford section of Westerly is still standing, still rolling out camouflage fabric for military uniforms, still providing jobs, albeit nowhere near as many as when it was the town's largest employer. Closed in November 2008, it reopened little more than a month later under new ownership as Bradford Printing & Finishing LLC.

After nearly a score of layoffs over the last several weeks, it has 45 employees.

Now, Nick Griseto, the former BDA executive who kept the century-old business going, is hoping he's not the one who presides over its demise, a fate he says could result from management's bargaining impasse with a labor union he insists his production workers don't want.

"I'm being put into a position where I can't survive," the 54-year-old Griseto, Bradford's president and chief executive officer, said Wednesday in an interview at the plant. "I can't continue to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on legal bills. If (employees) want a union, I have no problem with it. My proposal is on the table."

At this point, Griseto has no choice but to negotiate.

In a decision that came down last week, the National Labor Relations Board ruled that the company had "unlawfully refused to recognize and bargain with the incumbent union," the New England Joint Board/UNITE HERE. A three-member panel upheld an administrative law judge who discounted a 2009 petition signed by employees who opposed continued union representation.

Judge Raymond Green, in his ruling last April, found the petition had been "tainted" by Griseto's "unlawful formation" of a "Guiding Coalition" - a group of managers and employees who were supposed to deal with labor matters at the plant. Even before the decision, the NLRB's regional director in Boston sought an injunction against Griseto in federal court in Rhode Island. In July, U. S. District Judge Mary Lisi granted the injunction, ordering Bradford Printing to negotiate a contract with the New England Joint Board.

While Griseto said the "well-thought-out" proposal he's offered the union places the ball in the union's court, the union disagrees.

"The (NLRB) decision says he must recognize the union and bargain in good faith," Warren Pepicelli, the New England Joint Board's manager, said Wednesday, referring to Griseto. "He has not done that. We're willing and able to sit down, but we're waiting for information from him regarding his benefits structure, his customers, his financial situation, who's in the bargaining unit, job descriptions …"

Pepicelli said the union has been representing workers at the plant for more than 30 years.

The union has continued to file complaints against the company with the NLRB's Boston office, even objecting to the "unilateral" way in which Griseto granted employees a 10 percent raise around the first of the year. Then, when delays in approving the defense budget held up apparel manufacturers' orders for fabric, Bradford's business slowed "to a trickle," Griseto said, forcing him to lay off 11 people.

He kept the raises in place, he said, but had to roll them back a couple of weeks later when he laid off eight more workers.

"Our business is off 60 to 70 percent," Griseto said. "We should be producing 25,000 yards of fabric a day, but we're down to 10,000 yards a day. … Up to the day of the flood (a year ago), we were making money."

Griseto walked a reporter through the cavernous, fire-scarred plant Wednesday, encouraging conversation with employees.

One of the machine operators, Brian Maggs, 44, of Wood River Junction, said he was a union officer when the previous management was in place.

"I don't want a union," he said. "We don't need one."

He said Griseto had boosted wages for some workers when he took over, and seemed intent on preserving as many jobs as possible.

Another employee, Tim McCord, 44, of Hopkinton, said much the same thing. He said employees have no complaints and don't need a union, adding, "Everybody feels that way."

A third employee, Irene Kold of Westerly, said firmly, "No comment."

b.hallenbeck@theday.com