Calco Plating, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 21, 1979

242 N.L.R.B. 1364 (N.L.R.B. 1979)

I)6DCISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Calco Plating, Inc. and Metal Processors Union, Local
No. 16, AFL-CIO, International Union Allied
Products and Novelty Workers, Petitioner. Case
13 RC 14799
June 21, 1979
DECISION ON REVIEW AND ORDER
By CHAIRMAN FANNING AND) MlMBIRKS PENEI.I. O
AND TRULESDAI.F
On July 28, 1978. the Regional Director for Region
13 issued a Decision and Direction of Election in the
above-entitled proceeding, in which he directed an
election to be held in the Petitioner's requested unit of
all of the Employer's production and maintenance
employees, excluding truckdrivers. Thereafter, in ac-
cordance with Section 102.67 of the National Labor
Relations Board Rules and Regulations, Series 8, as
amended, the Employer filed a timely request for re-
view of the Regional Director's decision on the
grounds that, in excluding truckdrivers from the unit
found appropriate, he made erroneous factual find-
ings and departed from officially reported precedent.
By telegraphic order dated August 28, 1978, the
National Labor Relations Board granted the Employ-
er's request fr review. Pursuant to the Board's proce-
dures, the election was held on August 31, 1978, and
the ballots were impounded pending the Board's deci-
sion on review. Thereafter, both the Employer and
the Petitioner filed briefs on review.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the
National abor Relations Act, as amended, the Na-
tional Labor Relations Board has delegated its au-
thority in this proceeding to a three-member panel.
The Board has reviewed the entire record in this
case and makes the following findings:
The Employer is engaged in the repairing and re-
plating of automobile bumpers and the plating of
manufactured metal products at its two plant facili-
ties and warehouse in Chicago, Illinois. At its Lara-
bee St. facility, automobile bumpers are straightened,
ground, and polished. The bumpers are then trans-
ferred to the Employer's Wood St. facility, where
they are plated, wrapped, and inventoried. Damaged
bumpers are stored at the Employer's warehouse until
they are taken to the Employer's plants for repair and
replating. At the Wood and Lrabee St. plants there
are, in addition to the office clericals, approximately
35 production and maintenance employees working
as platers, polishers, rackers, wrappers, salespeople,
and inventory employees. No employees are regularly
located at the warehouse.
The Employer's five truckdrivers are based at its
two-story Wood St. plant. Located on the first floor of
this building are the main lobby, the business offices,
the production areas, and the storage and loading
areas. The second floor is used for inventory where
wrapped and finished bumpers are stored until they
are scheduled for delivery. Immediately behind the
main lobby and next to the employees' timeclock is
the production area, housing the various plating lines,
and a racking area. Fifty feet south of this area is the
wrapping and buffing area for finished products. Ad-
jacent to the wrapping area are the storage and truck-
loading areas. There is no wall separating the truck
and wrapping areas.
Four of the Employer's five drivers operate its four
pickup trucks used for transporting bumpers and
have regular driver's licenses. The fifth driver oper-
ates the Employer's straight truck to transport manu-
factured metal products for plating at the Employer's
plants and has a "B" license, evidencing the fact that
he has passed a written truckdrivers' examination.
One-half to two-thirds of the truckdrivers' time is
spent in driving, either delivering ordered, finished
bumpers to customers or picking up damaged bump-
ers for unloading at the warehouse. One-third to one-
half of the truckdrivers' time is spent at the Employ-
er's plants. Drivers begin work at the Wood St. plant
by assisting the wrappers in wrapping "hot" (freshly
plated) bumpers with a protective covering that are
scheduled to be delivered that day, helping the stock-
man pull finished bumpers from inventory that are
also to be delivered, and then loading them onto their
trucks. After making deliveries and picking up dam-
aged bumpers, the drivers unload the bumpers at the
warehouse, go to the Larabee St. plant where with the
help of the polishers they load their trucks with
straightened and polished bumpers, and bring them
to the Wood St. plant where with the assistance of
other employees they unload the bumpers for replat-
ing. The drivers then assist in putting away finished
inventory as well as pulling from inventory and load-
ing onto their trucks those bumpers next on the
schedule for delivery. The truckdrivers do not per-
form work such as polishing, grinding, buffing, or
plating, except one driver, a former grinder, who
spends a few hours once a month grinding bumpers.
Four production and maintenance employees, a
plater, a polisher, a maintenance man, and a sales-
man, also drive the Employer's trucks, making cus-
tomer deliveries which were not ready for the regular
truckdrivers. Two of these production and mainte-
nance employees, the polisher and maintenance man,
also haul supplies and bumpers daily between the
Employer's Larabee and Wood St. plants.
Both the truckdrivers and production and mainte-
nance employees are paid weekly, have same pay
raises, and have identical fringe benefits such as vaca-
242 NLRB No. 200
1364
CALCO PLATING
tions, holidays, and health insurance. Moreover, both
are also subject to the same disciplinary rules, use the
same plant entrance, and punch in on the same time-
clock. There is no regular lunchroom and therefore
drivers, like the production and maintenance employ-
ees, usually eat out on the street next to the plant.
The pay rate for truckdrivers is in the middle of the
Employer's pay scale. Drivers, as well as maintenance
and inventory employees, begin work 2 hours later
than the other production employees. Although
truckdrivers and production and maintenance em-
ployees have separate immediate supervision, both
are also under the direct supervision of the Employ-
er's vice president.
Applying the rationale of E. H. Koester Bakery Co.,
Inc., 136 NLRB 1006 (1962), the Regional Director
concluded that the drivers' working conditions differ
sufficiently from the production and maintenance em-
ployees so as to warrant their exclusion. We disagree.
It is clear that the truckdrivers spend a substantial
amount of time at the Employer's plants working
with production employees or in close proximity
thereto. As the record evidence discloses, contrary to
the findings of the Regional Director, drivers regu-
larly perform production work by assisting in the
wrapping of replated bumpers and the pulling from
inventory those bumpers scheduled for delivery as
well as assisting in putting finished stock into inven-
tory. Moreover, one driver, a former grinder, occa-
sionally engages in his former production job. Fur-
thermore, the record also shows, again contrary to the
Regional Director's finding, that production and
maintenance employees perform drivers' work on a
regular basis by assisting the truckdrivers in the load-
ing and unloading of their trucks, making customer
deliveries which were not ready in time for the driv-
ers' scheduled departure, and daily hauling bumpers
and supplies between the Employer's Larabee and
Wood St. plants. Also, both truckdrivers and produc-
tion and maintenance employees are directly super-
vised, in part, by the Employer's vice president, have
same working conditions; comparable wages based
on same pay scale; and the same mode of compensa-
tion, pay raises, and fringe benefits. Accordingly, un-
der the criteria set forth in E. H. Koester, Co., Inc.,
supra, we find that the five truckdrivers herein share a
sufficient community of interest with the production
and maintenance employees so as to require their in-
clusion in the requested unit.' See Jero Steel Treating,
I In disagreeing with this conclusion, our dissenting colleague has failed to
consider the record in its entirety. Thus, in attempting to minimize the func-
tional integration between the 5 truckdrivers and the approximately 35 pro-
duction and maintenance employees, he overlooks the record testimony that,
in addition to wrapping "hot" bumpers, the drivers, upon completion of their
scheduled runs, regularly assist production employees in putting away fin-
Inc., 182 NLRB 522, 533 (1970): Easton Packing
Compan, 171 NLRB 1601 (1968): Donald Carroll
Metals, Inc., 185 NLRB 409 (1970).2
As the election herein was held in a unit which
excluded truckdrivers, we shall order that it be va-
cated. And, inasmuch as the Petitioner indicated at
the hearing that it is unwilling to proceed to an elec-
tion in the broader appropriate unit, we shall dismiss
the instant petition.
ORDER
It is hereby ordered that the election conducted on
August 31, 1978, be, and it hereby is, vacated, and
that the petition filed herein be, and it hereby is, dis-
missed.
MEMBER TRUESDAI.E, dissenting:
I cannot agree with my colleagues' decision which
finds inappropriate Petitioner's request for a unit of
production and maintenance employees excluding
five truckdrivers. I would find, as did the Regional
Director, that under the Board's recent decision in
Chin Industries, Inc., 232 NLRB 176 (1977), the peti-
tioned-for unit is appropriate. There we emphasized
that "absent a bargaining history in a more compre-
hensive unit or functional integration of a degree suf-
ficient to obliterate separate identity, a production
and maintenance unit normally constitutes an appro-
priate unit for collective-bargaining purposes." Id. at
177. (Emphasis supplied.) Clearly, therefore, a party,
such as the Employer here, who seeks to demonstrate
the inappropriateness of a production and mainte-
nance unit, has a weighty burden. Presumably, my
colleagues believe that this burden has been met here
and would require the inclusion of the truckdrivers in
ished inventory, tasks which are not incidental to driving but rather typical
to the production process. Moreover, he erroneously charactenrizes as "mean-
ingless interaction" the record testimony that at both plants the production
employees regularly assist the drivers in performing one of their primary
duties, the unloading and loading of their trucks. Similarly, while the four
production and maintenance employees who perform driving functions may
be, as the dissent points out, only a small percentage of the production and
maintenance unit, they constitute a group nearly equal in size to the entire
complement of truckdrivers employed herein. In addition, the dissent relies
on the fact that Vice President Hillstrand is assisted by two supervisors, but
fails to mention that the record evidence also shows that Hillstrand directly
supervises both production workers and drivers. Finally, the dissent's at-
tempt to establish a separate community of interest by the fact that drivers
eat lunch outside the plant ignores the record testimony that production and
maintenance employees, like the drivers, also eat lunch out in the street.
2 Unlike the Regional Director, we do not regard as controlling Chin In-
dusres, Inc., 232 NLRB 176 (1977), where the Board, in excluding branch
employees, rental drivers, and branch drivers from a production and mainte-
nance unit located at the employer's main plant, emphasized that the pro-
duction and maintenance employees worked together in a single processing
plant geographically separate from the drivers and branch employees and
that none of these excluded employees engaged in any processing or produc-
tion activities. Moreover, any driving performed by the production and
maintenance employees was done only in those instances when a driver was
absent. whereas in the instant case production and maintenance employees
perform their driving duties on a regular, daily basis.
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DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
the requested unit primarily because of the drivers'
interaction with the production and maintenance
workers. However, contrary to the impression created
by the majority, an analysis of the instant record
leads me to conclude that the interaction between the
two groups is not so extensive as to "obliterate" sig-
nificant distinctions that exist between them.
First, my colleagues must concede that the mere,
and frequently inevitable, interaction between pro-
duction and maintenance workers and truckdrivers
does not-ipso facto-compel their inclusion in an
overall unit. Rather, it is the character and frequency
of that interaction which must be examined to deter-
mine if the normal distinctions between the two
groups have, in a given case, been "obliterated."
Here, it is clear that, unlike the production and main-
tenance workers, the truckdrivers are primarily em-
ployed to work outside the plant in order to transport
unfinished bumpers between the Employer's facilities
and to deliver finished bumpers to the Employer's
customers. Not only does the majority concede that
the drivers spend one-half to two-thirds of their time
away from the plant, but record testimony reveals
that this figure does not truly reflect the full amount
of time the truckdrivers perform their driving duties.
In this regard, while Ronald L. Hillstrand, the Em-
ployer's vice president, initially testified that the driv-
ers spend one-third to one-half of their worktime per-
forming tasks within the plant, he later admitted on
cross-examination that this figure also included time
spent on the road transporting bumpers to and from
the Employer's facilities. Thus, the one-half to two-
thirds figure cited by the majority only reflects time
away from the plant delivering bumpers to the Em-
ployer's customers and, when viewed more accu-
rately, it is apparent that the truckdrivers, in fact,
spend the great majority of their worktime away from
the production and maintenance employees. Further-
more, while emphasizing the contact between the two
employee groups, the majority fails to recognize that
whatever meaningful interaction exists is limited to
that at the Employer's Wood Street facility. The driv-
ers are not based at the Larabee Street facility where
the Employer employs some of the production and
maintenance workers sought by Petitioner. Thus,
aside from the need to load and unload bumpers at
Larabee Street, the truckdrivers spend no time there
and thus have minimal interaction with those em-
ployees.
Admittedly, the truckdrivers do spend time at the
Wood Street facility and, as a result, do interact with
those production and maintenance workers. But aside
from assisting the wrappers in wrapping "hot" bump-
ers, the drivers spend their remaining time at the
plant performing tasks incidental to the driving re-
sponsibilities-they gather bumpers from inventory
for transport, and they load and unload their trucks.
Only an insignificant amount of their in-plant time is
actually spent performing production and mainte-
nance work.4 Thus, viewing the record in its entirety,
one gets the picture of five truckdrivers who are func-
tionally engaged in the transportation of an employ-
er's product rather than its production. The
truckdrivers work outside the plant; they eat lunch
outside the plant; they do not, aside from wrapping,
engage in typical production tasks: and they spend
much of their in-plant time engaged in work directly
related to truckdriving, not production or mainte-
nance. When these factors are considered in conjunc-
tion with the fact that the truckdrivers have separate
immediate supervision, it becomes even clearer that
these five drivers constitute a functionally distinct
group which may, upon request, 6 be excluded from
the production and maintenance unit.7 That there are
factors here which support the appropriateness of an
all-inclusive unit of production and maintenance em-
ployees plus the truckdrivers is of no moment, for
Petitioner need not seek the most appropriate unit, it
being sufficient that Petitioner has requested a unit
traditionally found to be appropriate, and there is
record evidence, as discussed above, demonstrating
that production and maintenance workers are, in sig-
nificant aspects, separate and distinct from the
truckdrivers.? The Regional Director recognized this
I The Board has held that such tasks as gathenng, loading, and unloading
are related to the drivers' transportation function and therefore do not dem-
onstrate the inappropnateness of excluding truckdrivers from a production
and maintenance unit. See, e.g., Chin Industries, Inc., supra at 177.
Moreover, it is by no means clear, as my colleagues suggest, that the
drivers assist the wrappers regularly. In this regard, Ronald L. Hillstrand,
the Employer's vice president and the only witness at the hearing, answered,
in response to questions about the truckdrivers' wrapping duties, that "at
times, the truckdrivers will help the wrapper wrap a bumper if he's in a hurry
and they have to get it wrapped." (Emphasis supplied.) In addition, at the
hearing Hillstrand subsequently created further doubt about the truckdriv-
ers' participation in production and maintenance work, testifying that, aside
from dnving, loading, and unloading, the drivers do not engage in such other
work as polishing, buffing, plating, or "whatever else is involved."
I While, as my colleagues suggest, the production and maintenance em-
ployees may eat their lunch out in the street, it is apparent that they do not
eat their lunch with the drivers who eat their lunch away from the plant on
the road.
6 I note from the Regional Director's decision that a Teamsters Local has
filed a petition seeking to represent the five truckdrivers in a separate unit.
' While my colleagues emphasize that Vice President Hillstrand is the gen-
eral overseer for both production and maintenance workers and the
truckdrivers, they fail to note that Hillstrand has two supervisors who assist
him, Charles Baily who supervises the truckdrivers and Booker Chandler
who supervises the production and maintenance employees.
' Certainly, the fact that 4 of the Employer's 34 production and mainte-
nance employees make deliveries in the Employer's trucks is a probative
factor demonstrating the appropriateness of an all-inclusive unit. However, I
also note that this driving is only performed by a small percentage of the
production and maintenance employees; two of the four workers engage in
no interplant driving; the four workers do not make customer deliveries on a
daily basis, but only when a necessary part is not completed when the regu-
lar drivers are scheduled to leave; the amount of time actually spent dnving
is relatively minor when compared to their time spent performing their pri-
mary work in production and maintenance; and their deliveries do not bring
1366
CALCO PL.ATING
reality and properly upheld Petitioner's unit request.
His decision, as noted above, relied on Chin Indus-
tries, Inc., supra, a case with facts strikingly similar to
those herein, but which my colleagues completely fail
to distinguish. There, the Board found appropriate a
requested production and maintenance unit, exclud-
ing, inter alia, three branch drivers, notwithstanding
the fact that the drivers spent nearly 50 percent of
their time working in the plant either loading, unload-
ing, or, when not preparing for transport, assisting in
maintenance work. As the Board found that the du-
ties of the branch drivers--both within and without
the plant-were, as they are here, principally related
with transportation, not production or maintenance,
the in-plant interaction between the two groups was
found insufficient to "obliterate the separate identity"
of the requested production and maintenance unit.
The majority attempts to distinguish Chin, claiming
that the "production and maintenance employees
worked together in a single processing plant geo-
graphically separate from the drivers .... " Quite
simply, the majority misstates the facts and misses the
point. It is apparent from that decision that the
branch drivers spent nearly 50 percent of their time at
the plant and that, in addition to their in-plant time
the four workers into increased contact with the regular truckdrivers. Ac-
cordingly, without unduly minimizing the significance of this activity, I find
that, when measured against those countervailing factors discussed above.
this dnving does not demonstrate such integration between the truckdrivers
and the production and maintenance employees as to require the inclusion of
the truckdrinvers in the petitioned-for unit.
preparing for transport, the branch drivers directly
assisted in the performance of maintenance work.9
Moreover, as brought out in the concurring opinion
in Chin, the production and maintenance workers in
that case performed the work of the branch drivers
whenever one of the latter was absent. While this in-
plant interaction may have demonstrated the appro-
priateness of an all-inclusive unit which included the
branch drivers, such interaction did not render the
production and maintenance unit inappropriate. Due
to the obvious similarities with the instant case, the
Regional Director herein found Chin dispositive. I
agree.10
Accordingly, for the above-stated reasons I would
find the petitioned-for unit of production and mainte-
nance employees to be appropriate and, therefore, re-
spectfully dissent from my colleagues' holding to the
contrary.
I In attempting to distinguish Chin, my colleagues conveniently ignore this
fact. choosing to emphasize that the branch drivers n Chin Industries Inc,
supra, unlike the drivers here, perform no production work However, since
the unit involved in Chin Industries Inc.. supra. was a production and mainte-
nance unit, the drivers' performance of in-plant maintenance work is as rel-
evant as the performance of production work in determining whether the
drivers have become integrated into the production and maintenance unit.
'0See also Giordano Lumber Co., Inc., 133 NLRB 205. 206 (1961), where
the Board stated:
These employees spend substantially more than 50 percent of their time
during the 5-month rush season, and at least half or more of their time
during the remaining 7 months of the year. performing truckdriser du-
ties. When not engaged in their driving duties, they 'orL at arious jobs in
the ard or mill. As the regular truckdrivers spend a maJontN of their
time in driver duties, we find that they constitute a functionally distinct
group such as the Board finds may be separately represented. Emphasis
supplied.]
1367