Central Transformer Corp.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jan 30, 1968

169 N.L.R.B. 464 (N.L.R.B. 1968)

464 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Moloney Electric Company , Division of Central
Transformer Corporation and District No. 9, In-
ternational Association of Machinists and
Aerospace Workers, AFL-CIO, Petitioner. Case
14-RC-5593
January 30, 1968
DECISION AND ORDER
BY CHAIRMAN MCCULLOCH AND MEMBERS
FANNING AND BROWN
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of
the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a
hearing was held before Hearing Officer Richard D.
Curren. Following the hearing and pursuant to Sec-
tion 102.67 of the National Labor Relations Board
Rules and Regulations and Statements of
Procedure, Series 8, as amended, and by direction
of the Regional Director for Region 14, this case
was transferred to the National Labor Relations
Board for decision. Briefs have been timely filed by
the Employer, the Petitioner, and the Intervenor.'
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the
Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connec-
tion with this case to a three -member panel.
The Board has reviewed the Hearing Officer's
rulings made at the hearing and finds that they are
free from prejudicial error. They are hereby af-
firmed.
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board
finds:2
1. The parties stipulated, and we find, that the
Employer is engaged in commerce within the mean-
ing of the Act, and that it will effectuate the pur-
poses of the Act to assert jurisdiction herein.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to
represent certain employees of the Employer.
3. No question affecting commerce exists con-
cerning the representation of certain employees of
the Employer within the meaning of Section 9(c)(1)
and Section 2(6) and (7) of the Act for the following
reasons:
The Petitioner seeks to represent all employees
in the maintenance department at the Employer's
St. Louis plant, excluding the maintenance electri-
cians and stationary engineers , office clerical and
professional employees, guards, and supervisors as
defined in the Act, and all other employees. The
Employer and the Intervenor moved to dismiss the
petition on the ground that a separate departmental
unit of maintenance employees would be inap-
propriate. The Intervenor has represented a unit of
the Employer's. production and maintenance em-
ployees since 1937. On May 11, 1949, the Inter-
venor became the certified representative of these
employees. On August 12, 1960, after a severance
election, Local No. 2, International Union of
Operating Engineers was certified to represent the
stationary engineers in the maintenance depart-
ment. On April 14, 1961, Local 1, International
Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, became the cer-
tified representative for a separate unit of the main-
tenance electricians after another severance elec-
tion.
The Employer manufactures electric transform-
ers for sale to the electrical utility industry. The
Employer at present employs some 683 produc-
tion and maintenance people. Included in this
complement are 39 in the maintenance depart-
ment , of whom 4 are operating engineers and 12 are
maintenance electricians currently represented
separately. The remaining maintenance employees
are classified as follows: 13 mechanics, 3 welders,
1 stockroom attendant, 1 hand saw filer, 1 air tools
repairman, I painter, 1 automotive mechanic, 1 car-
penter, and 1 oiler. These maintenance department
employees have separate supervision and have their
headquarters in a separately enclosed area of the
plant where they receive their work orders and per-
form a small portion of their customary main-
tenance work; their function is to perform installa-
tion, maintenance, and repair of the Employer's
plant and equipment. The record does not establish
that they have a high degree of skill or that any spe-
cial training is required.
On March 14, 1963, the Petitioner requested cer-
tification for a unit consisting of the same group of
employees herein sought. After a hearing, the
Board issued its Decision and Order dated July 2,
1963, dismissing the petition.3 The Board stated:
Thus it is clear that the maintenance depart-
ment is not a homogeneous group of skilled
craftsmen to which craft severance is
customarily given. The Petitioners, in fact, do
not request severance on that basis. They
simply seek a departmental severance of the
maintenance employees. While in the past the
Board has in certain circumstances permitted
the separate representation of maintenance de-
partment employees in the absence of prior col-
lective-bargaining history (Matter of Arm-
strong Cork Company, 80 NLRB 1328, 1329;
' The Electrical Workers Independent Union , hereinafter referred to as
Intervenor, was allowed to intervene on the basis of its contractual in-
terest . International Union of Operating Engineers, Stationary Local No.
2, AFL-CIO, and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers,
Local No. 1, AFL-CIO, intervened for the sole purpose of protecting the
units they currently represent and thereafter withdrew from participation
in the hearing.
2 On October 20, 1967, the Employer filed a motion to strike from the
record certain of Petitioner 's exhibits , since copies of these exhibits had
not been furnished to the Employer. At the hearing, Petitioner had agreed
to make copies available to the Employer . Petitioner's Statement in Op-
position to Employer's Motion to Strike alleges that copies of these ex-
hibits were mailed to Employer's counsel on October 18,1967, more than
6 weeks before the deadline for filing briefs. The Employer does not con-
test this statement . Accordingly , Employer's motion is hereby denied.
Case 14-RC-4543, not published in NLRB volumes.
169 NLRB No. 66
MOLONEY ELECTRIC COMPANY 465
American Cyanamid Co., 131 NLRB 1909,
1910), it has consistently been our policy to
refuse to sever a group of maintenance depart-
ment employees from an existing production
and maintenance unit in the face of a substan-
tial collective-bargaining history on a plant-
wide basis, Seville-Sea Isle Hotel Corp., 125
NLRB 299, 300). Accordingly, we shall
dismiss the instant petition.
The Employer and the Intervenor contend: "(a)
That there has been no substantial change in the
Employer's operations or organization since the
1963 decision in Case No. 14-RC-4543 denying
this same Petitioner's request for severance of this
same maintenance group from the same historical
plant-wide production and maintenance unit; [and]
(b) that there has been no substantial change in any
of the other conditions or circumstances set forth in
the record of Case No. 14-RC-4543." Indeed,
Petitioner does not challenge this assertion. Rather,
it contends that consideration of the petition in light
of the principles enunciated in Mallinckrodt Chemi-
cal Works, Uranium Division,4 will lead to a dif-
ferent result. We find no merit in this contention.
A review of the factors set forth in Mallinckrodt,
as applied to the facts here, leads us to the conclu-
sion that virtually every single guidepost there set
forth for consideration of severance petitions,
militates against a finding that the unit here sought
is appropriate for severance. We deal here, not with
a "distinct and homogeneous group of skilled jour-
neymen craftsmen" or with "employees constitut-
ing a functionally distinct department, working in
trades or occupations for which a tradition' of
separate representation exists," but with a
heterogeneous group of diversified workers who
perform routine maintenance functions at locations
all over the plant, in company with nonmaintenance
department employees, using tools, equipment, and
machinery similar to and sometimes belonging to
the production departments. The maintenance de-
partment has been represented by the Intervenor in
a production and maintenance unit for 30 years.
Further, the evidence indicates that each of Central
Transformer Corporation's other plants has a single
plantwide production and maintenance unit. Nor
does it appear from this record that other employers
in the transformer manufacturing industry generally
have bargaining patterns different from that prevail-
ing with this Employer. The maintenance depart-
ment here is one of 18 departments of this plant of
the Employer, and the evidence shows that the In-
tervenor's shop steward for some of these depart-
ments, including the maintenance department, has
almost always been an employee of the main-
tenance department.
Thus, it is clear that even if we were to find that
the Mallinckrodt rationale requires review of the
Board's 1963 refusal to sever the maintenance de-
partment from the production and maintenance
unit, we would nevertheless find that severance of
the unit here sought is inappropriate for the pur-
poses of collective bargaining. We shall, therefore,
dismiss the petition.
ORDER
It is hereby ordered that the petition filed herein
be, and it hereby is, dismissed.
4 162 NLRB 887.