Charles City Press

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Feb 12, 1978

240 N.L.R.B. 721 (N.L.R.B. 1978)

CHARLES CITY PRESS 721
Charles City Press, a Division of Mid-America Pub-
lishing Corp. and Charles City Typographical Union
No. 893, AFL-CIO, affiliated with International
Typographical Union, Petitioner. Case 18 RC
11931
February 12, 1978
DECISION AND CERTIFICATION OF
RESULTS
BY CHAIRMAN FANNING AND MEMBERS PENEI:IIO
AND TRU!ESDAI.I
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of
the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a
hearing was held on August 2, 1978. Following the
hearing, the Regional Director for Region 18 issued a
Decision and Direction of Election finding, inter alia,
that employee Connie Buttjer was eligible to vote in
the election directed for a bargaining unit of "all full-
time and regular part-time circulation mailing de-
partment employees employed by the Employer at its
Charles City, Iowa facility." Thereafter, the Em-
ployer timely filed a request for review of the Re-
gional Director's decision, contesting the inclusion of
employee Buttjer in the unit found appropriate. On
September 11, 1978, the National Labor Relations
Board, by telegraphic order, found that the
Employer's request for review raised a substantial is-
sue concerning Buttjer's unit placement and that this
issue could best be resolved through the challenge
procedure. Accordingly, the Board directed that the
Decision and Direction of Election be amended to
permit Buttjer to vote under challenge.
An election by secret ballot was held on Septem-
ber 12, 1978, and the resultant tally of ballots was
two for and two against the Petitioner. A single chal-
lenged ballot, cast by Buttjer, was sufficient to affect
the results of the election. Thereafter, the parties en-
tered into a stipulation to clarify the transcript, and
the Regional Director transferred the case to the
Board for decision.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the
National Labor 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 considered the entire record in this
case with respect to the issue initially raised by the
Employer's request for review and makes the follow-
ing findings:
The Employer's newspaper publishing operations
involve approximately 27 fulltime, part-time. and
temporary employees who work in various depart-
ments located throughout its three-floor facility. The
240 NLRB No. 103
parties have agreed that the bargaining unit at issue
herein should include the three part-time employees
in the Employer's circulation mailing department
and employee Betty Meyer. a dual-function employ-
ee promoted from the ranks of the aforementioned
employees, who serves as their lead person and also
oversees the Employer's newspaper carriers. As pre-
viously indicated, the Regional Director agreed with
the Petitioner that employee Connie Buttjer should
also be included in the unit, primarily on the basis of
a close community of interest found to exist between
Meyer and Buttjer. The Employer contends, how-
ever, that Buttjer's inclusion in a unit of its circula-
tion mailing department employees would be inap-
propriate because she is an office clerical who, in
fact, does not share a sufficient community of inter-
est with the four employees whose unit eligibility is
undisputed. We find merit in this contention.
The three part-time unit employees work exclu-
sivelv in the circulation mailing department office,
located at one end of the basement floor in the
Employer's building. They take newspapers after
they come off the press, stuff inserts, bundle and tie
the papers, and run papers through an addressing
machine if they are destined for mail distribution.
These employees receive from $2.65 to $2.90 per
hour and are not eligible for any fringe benefit pro-
grams maintained by the Employer for its full-time
employees.
Betty Mever has a desk in the circulation book-
keeping and carrier distribution office, located at the
far end of the basement floor from the circulation
mailing department. As circulation mailing depart-
ment lead person, however, Meyer apparently spends
approximately 30 percent of her time working along-
side the three part-time employees in that depart-
ment. The rest of her time is spent directing carrier
operations and performing minor bookkeeping func-
tions. Although she is eligible as a full-time employee
to participate in the Employer's hospitalization and
stock ownership plans, she is classified as a circula-
tion mailing department employee for accounting
purposes and is thus paid only $2.90 per hour, the
highest wage in that classification.
Unlike the individuals discussed above. Connie
Buttjer is a full-time office clerical and is classified as
a general department employee for the Employer's
accounting purposes. Her wage rate is $3 per hour on
a departmental wage scale which ranges from $2.75
to $3.50.' She is currently eligible for all full-time
employee fringe benefits. Buttjer spends approxi-
mately 85 percent of her working time performing
In hil Decision and [)Drecllon f lecilon the Regilnal I)lrector errone-
ouskl found that the pa range for general department emp:o es .as $2 75
1o Mnls 53 per hour
CHARLES CITY PRESS
__ .
722 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
circulation department bookkeeping duties at a desk
adjacent to Meyer's desk on the basement floor, ap-
proximately 10 percent of her time engaged in related
tasks in the circulation department office on the first
floor, and most of her remaining time assisting an-
other clerical employee in the bookkeeping office on
the second floor. Her contacts with the circulation
mailing department are essentially limited to brief,
routine daily visits there in order to exchange stencils
for the addressing machine and to pick up 85 news-
papers for counter sale and interoffice distribution.
Buttjer and Meyer do spend considerable time
working next to each other at their desks in the circu-
lation bookkeeping and carrier distribution office.
but their physical proximity does not signify func-
tional identity. The two employees share certain mi-
nor and perfunctory tasks, such as recording sub-
scription information on filecards and preparing
mailing stencils for the addressing machine. They
also apparently assist each other in the supervision of
carrier operations. Buttjer does not, however, assist
Meyer in the performance of her lead person duties
in the circulation mailing department, and Meyer
does not engage in most of the office clerical func-
tions which fill Buttjer's workday. In fact, when
asked how much time Meyers spent in the basement-
floor office with Buttjer, the latter testified: "I don't
know. I would say maybe 70 percent of her time. I
don't know because I really don't pay that much at-
tention to what she does. She goes out and helps in
the adjacent mailing room some, but I really don't
pay that much attention to what she does."
The above recitation of evidence fails to disclose
the close community of interest found by the Region-
al Director to exist between Buttjer and the circula-
tion mailing department unit employees. On the con-
trary, the record indicates that Buttjer is paid more
than the highest paid employee in that department,
receives benefits to which the part-time unit employ-
ees are not entitled, performs office clerical functions
which are not interchangeable with the manual tasks
performed by those employees, and only makes brief
incidental daily visits to their work area. In addition,
although Buttjer and Meyer spend considerable time
working in the same office, they spend most of that
time independently engaged in unrelated activities.
While the record supports the parties' stipulation that
Meyer should be included as a dual-function em-
plovee in the circulation mailing department unit be-
cause she performs substantial lead person duties in
that department, there is no evidence of a similarly
significant duality in Buttjer's job.
Based on the foregoing, we find that Connie
Buttjer is an office clerical employee who should not
be included in the production-related circulation
mailing department bargaining unit. Accordingly, we
conclude that the challenge to the ballot cast by
Buttjer should be sustained and that the results of the
election should be certified.
CERTIFICATION OF RESULTS OF ELECTION
It is hereby certified that a majority of the valid
ballots have not been cast for Charles City Typo-
graphical Union No. 893, AFL-CIO, affiliated with
International Typographical Union, and that said la-
bor organization is not the exclusive representative of
all the employees, in the unit herein involved, within
the meaning of Section 9(a) of the National Labor
Relations Act, as amended.