Chicago Local 245, Graphic Arts International Union

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Mar 28, 1975

217 N.L.R.B. 160 (N.L.R.B. 1975)

160 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Chicago Local 245, Graphic Arts International Union,
AIFL-CIO' and The Post Tribune , a Division of
Northwest Publications , Inc. and Chicago Stereoty-
pers Union No. 4, AFL-CIO. Case 13-CD-244
March 28, 1975
DECISION-AND DETERMINATION OF
DISPUTE
BY MEMBERS JENKINS , KENNEDY, AND PENELLO
This is a proceeding under Section 10(k) of the Na-
tional Labor Relations Act, as amended, following
charges filed by The Post Tribune, a Division of North-
west Publications, Inc., herein called the Employer,
alleging that Chicago Local 245, Graphic Arts Interna-
tional Union, AFL-CIO, herein called Photoengrav-
ers, has violated Section 8(b)(4)(D) of the Act by en-
gaging in certain proscribed activities with an object of
forcing or requiring the Employer to maintain its as-
signnnent of certain work to employees represented by
Photoengravers rather than to employees represented
by Chicago Stereotypers Union No. 4, AFL-CIO,
herein called Stereotypers. A duly scheduled hearing
was held before Hearing Officer James M. McAuliff on
December 16 and 17, 1974.2 All parties appeared and
were afforded full opportunity to be heard, to examine
and cross-examine witnesses, and adduce evidence
bearing on the issues. Thereafter, the Employer, the
Photoengravers, and the Stereotypers filed briefs.
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 reviewed the rulings made by the
Hearing Officer at the hearing and finds they are free
from prejudicial error. The rulings are hereby affirmed.
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board makes
the following findings:
I THE BUSINESS OF THE EMPLOYER
The Post Tribune, A Division of Northwest Publica-
tions, Inc., is a Delaware corporation engaged in the
publication of a daily newspaper in Gary, Indiana.
During the past calendar or fiscal year, the Employer
had a gross volume of business in excess of $200,000,
and it purchased and received from suppliers outside
the State of Indiana goods valued in excess of $50,000.
The Employer also carries local and national advertis-
ing, subscribes to interstate news services, and pub-
lishes nationally syndicated features. Accordingly, we
find, as the parties have stipulated, that the Employer
1 The names of the parties appear as amended at the hearing
2 All dates hereafter are in 1974 unless otherwise stated.
is engaged in commerce within the meaning of Section
2(6) and (7) of the Act and that it will effectuate the
policies of the Act to assert jurisdiction herein.
II THE LABOR ORGANIZATIONS
The parties stipulated , and we find, that the Photo-
engravers and the Stereotypers are labor organizations
within the meaning of the Act.
III. THE DISPUTE
A. Background and Facts of the Dispute
Traditionally the Employer has used hot and cold-
type processes to print its newspapers, with the cold-
type processes predominating and expected to supplant
the hot-type processes completely by March 1975. In-
volved herein is the switchover by the Employer from
one cold-type process to another.
Under the traditional cold-type process, composing
room employees, by a technique referred to as "photo-
composition," produce a body of reading matter on
paper, which is then pasted into position on a larger flat
piece of paper in the desired format. In the photoen-
graving department the pasted-up page, after being
checked for size and appropriateness for reproduction
by the photoengraving process, is placed on a copy
board in front of a large camera and reproduced on
film. After the negative is developed and inspected it
goes in a vacuum frame where it is placed on a photo-
sensitive plate made of zinc or magnesium. Using a
very high intensity light, the image from the negative
is transferred onto the photosensitive material. The
plate is then subjected to an "etching" stage, which
removes the plate surface in the soft nonimage areas,
leaving the reading matter and other image material in
relief form on the plate surface. The plate must be
examined to determine dot structure and depth of the
etch. Finally, the plate is proofed and cut to proper size.
The product of this process is a thin, lightweight,
flexible plate carrying the image material in relief form,
capable of being used as a printing plate, and ready for
mounting on a press. However, because of cost of pro-
duction and limited speed of production of the equip-
ment heretofore employed for this process, direct print-
ing use of these photoengraving plates has not been
economically feasible.
Instead, the Employer has operated an additional
department to create duplicate plates by the technique
known as stereotyping. The completed plate is trans-
ferred to the composing room for inclusion in a page
form or chase. The composing room sends it over to the
stereotyping department.
Stereotypers first transfer the copy from the mag-
nesium plate to a moist papier mache mat by placing
217 NLRB No. 31
CHICAGO LOCAL 245, GRAPHIC ARTS INTERNATIONAL UNION
the matrix against the plate and subjecting it to the
proper amount of pressure using a mat roller. The ma-
trix is then removed, trimmed, and formed. It is put in
a scorcher where it is dried. The relief matrix is then
placed in a casting box where molten lead is poured
against it, thus producing, after cooling and hardening,
a semicylindrical lead plate containing a raised image
of what is to be printed. The plate is milled and cooled,
and then sent to the pressroom where it is mounted on
the press.
The Employer contemplates that the speed of the
Merigraph platemaking system will allow it to meet its
press needs for a sufficient number of thin, flexible
relief plates without the necessity for producing dupli-
cates of the plates in the stereotyping department. Un-
der the Merigraph system, the production stages from
the original pasteup copy delivered by the composing
room through the camera, film developing, and han-
dling will remain unchanged and will use the same
equipment in the same location . The Merigraph system
continues to utilize the technique of a plate material,
coated with a light-sensitive surface, with the film
placed between that surface and a light source. How-
ever, the plate material in this process is a liquid
photopolymer resin rather than magnesium. In addi-
tion, the nuArc Printer, the plate processor, the etcher
and its control panel, and certain other associated
equipment presently used will be removed from the
photoengraving department and be replaced by two
Merigraph 200 exposure units and companion Meri-
graph developing units.
In the Merigraph process, the image is transferred to
the surface of the plate by the same technique of hard-
ening of the areas as a result of the passage of the light
through the clear portions of the negative, while the
nonimage portions of the plate surface remain soft as
a result of the blocking of the light by the dark, nonim-
age portions of the negative. The unwanted back-
ground material continues to be removed by a subtrac-
tive process, in this case using detergent and water
followed by an airstream in a "washout unit," as distin-
guished from a nitric acid solution in the case of mag-
nesium.
The inspection process as performed on a Merigraph
plate is exactly the same as the inspection process per-
formed by photoengravers on a finished magnesium
plate. Factors such as relief depth, shoulder configura-
tion dot structure, serif configuration, and other mat-
ters are checked, and the skills involved in checking a
finished Merigraph plate are the same as the skills -nec-
essary to inspect a finished magnesium plate. The sig-
nificant difference will be that the finished plates are
completed at a rate sufficiently fast to permit the pro-
duction of enough plates to meet the Employer's press
needs so that duplication by the stereotyping process
161
will no longer be needed. It is expected that there will
be a transition period when some of the plates produced
on the Merigraph equipment will be used as "pattern"
plates and will go on through the stereotype process, as
in the past, while others will be used as direct printing
plates.
The Merigraph system itself would operate at a sub-
stantial pace only for about 2 hours per day. When the
persons operating the Merigraph process are not oc-
cupied on this process, the Employer intends to place
them in other parts of the photoengraving operation.
B. The Work in Dispute
The work in dispute involves the operation of a new
machine and printing process known as the Merigraph
Photo-Relief plate system.
C. Contentions of the Parties
The Employer and the Photoengravers contend that
the Employer's assignment of the disputed work to
employees represented by Photoengravers should be
upheld. In this regard they rely on the following fac-
tors: the Board's certification of the Photoengravers,
the contract between the Employer and the Photoen-
gravers, industry and area practice, relative skills,
economy of operations, job impact, and employer pref-
erence.
The Stereotypers contends that the work should be
assigned to employees it represents based on the follow-
ing factors: the contract between the Employer and the
Stereotypers, the Board's limited certification of the
Photoengravers, and job impact.
D. Applicability of the Statute
Before the Board may proceed to the determination
of a dispute pursuant to Section 10(k) of the Act, it
must be satisfied that: (1) the parties have not agreed
upon a method for the voluntary adjustment of the
dispute, and (2) there is reasonable cause to believe that
Section 8(b)(4)(D) has been violated.
As to (1) above, the parties stipulated at the hearing,
and we find, that there is no agreed-upon method of
voluntary adjustment of the dispute which would be
binding on all the parties.
As to (2) above, the Employer assigned the work to
employees represented by Photoengravers on Novem-
ber 13, and notified the Stereotypers that stereotypers'
work would be eliminated by the new process. On
November, 22, the Stereotypers claimed the disputed
work and invoked the grievance procedure of its con-
tract with the Employer. On December 9, the Photoen-
gravers notified the Employer that it claimed the work
under its contract with the Employer and threatened
162 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
"all appropriate-action necessary, including strike ac-
tion," should the work be assigned in any manner in-
consistent with its claim. We find on these facts that
reasonable cause exists to believe that Section
8(b)(4)(D) of the Act has been violated. Accordingly,
we find that the dispute is properly before the Board for
determination under Section 10(k) of the Act.
E. Merits of the Dispute
1. Area or industry practice
Testimony was adduced by the Employer and the
Photoengravers to the effect that predominant industry
and area practice was to assign the Merigraph process
to photoengravers in situations where stereotypers
were employed, with the exception of situations where
photoengravers were merged with stereotypers into a
new unit entirely. Stereotypers cited only one-instance
where such operations had been assigned to their mem-
bers but acknowledged that the plant in question had
no photoengravers.
In these circumstances, we find that this factor fa-
vors the Photoengravers.
2. Economy and efficiency of operations
Under the Employer' s existing assignment , photoen-
gravers who are performing the Merigraph process,
which only occupies about 2 hours a day, are also
available to perform other assignments in the photoen-
graving department, such as the photographic, film
developing, and film correction operations. On the
other hand, it would appear that the Employer would
lose this flexibility of moving employees back and forth
between and among the various functions of the entire
photoengraving department if the disputed work were
assigned to stereotypers. Stereotypers admittedly do
not have experience with negatives, exposure time, or
any other photo or chemical process and do not require
photographic skills in their work as stereotypers. Thus,
if the Merigraph platemaking work is assigned to them
they will be idle during the balance of their working
day, since the introduction of the Merigraph process
will totally eliminate the existing work in the stereoty-
ping department.
Accordingly, inasmuch as the assignment of the
Merigraph process work to photoengravers contributes
to the effective utilization of those employees and the
efficient operation of the Employer's business, we find
that this factor favors an assignment to photoengrav-
ers.
3. Skill
Although Stereotypers claims that its. people can be
trained to operate the Merigraph equipment satisfac-
torily, the record makes it clear that the skills and
experience of photoengravers are more adaptable to the
efficient operations of the Merigraph equipment. Un-
like photoengravers, stereotypers have had no experi-
ence with negatives, exposure time, or, for that matter,
anything else related to photography. Photoengravers
through experience and training possess better creden-
tials to assess the quality of the plate as it progresses
through the various stages of development, and to be
able to diagnose what should be done about any defects
that may appear or problems that may arise.
Accordingly, we find this factor favors assignment of
the work in dispute to employees represented by Photo-
engravers.
4. Job impact
If the disputed work is awarded to photoengravers,
the result will be that there will no longer be any stereo-
typers employed by the Employer. Such would consti-
tute a loss of nine jobs. If the work is awarded to
stereotypers, five stereotypers would be retained and
five photoengravers would be retained. The resulting
jobs lost to each of the crafts would be four stereotyping
jobs and three photoengraving jobs.
It is clear here that no matter which group of em-
ployees receives the work, the other group will suffer
a loss of employment. Nevertheless, we find that, in
absolute number of jobs lost and impact on the con-
tinuity of the craft, employees employed as stereotypers
will suffer more in the way of job loss than will those
employed as photoengravers. We further find that job
impact adversity would be more equally shared among
the competing groups if the work were awarded to
stereotypers inasmuch as in that case both of them
would suffer an approximate 50-percent loss in jobs.
Although we recognize that the individual photoen-
gravers losing jobs because of the absence of such favor-
able softening provisions as those provided in the
Stereotypers contract, we find this factor insufficient to
offset the quantitatively larger impact on jobs and unit
that the stereotypers would suffer.
Accordingly, for the above reasons, we conclude that
job impact would appear to favor an award of the work
to stereotypers.
5. Certification and collective-bargaining agreements
Pursuant to an election conducted March 22, 1960,
in Case 13-RC-7023, the Photoengravers was certified
as the collective-bargaining representative of all em-
CHICAGO LOCAL 245, GRAPHIC ARTS INTERNATIONAL UNION
ployees in the photoengraving department of the Em-
ployer
. . . who are engaged in producing photo-
engraved plates from any copy furnished by the
Employer to the Photo-engraving Department, or
who are engaged in any of the processes pertaining
to the production of photoengraved plates after
the copy is furnished to the Department including
photography and the processing of all negatives
and positives for plate-making purposes, the mak-
ing of masks for color separations , for plate-mak-
ing purposes , drop out on plates or negatives, and
retouching, color-scanning, stripping, painting,
etching , finishing, engraving , tint-laying , routing,
blocking and proofing , and including also the op-
eration of such electronic plate-making devices
and machines as the Fairchild Scan -A-Graver and
Scan-A-Sizer and the Klischograph, all in connec-
tion with and limited to the production of photo-
engraved plates in the Employer's Photo-Engrav-
ing Department.
Since July 4, 1960, the date of the initial collective-
bargaining agreement between the Employer and the
Photoengravers , through the present agreement, the
Photoengravers contracts have provided for jurisdic-
tion over:
The process of photoengraving and its attendant
work thereto is defined as being and is all opera-
tions of the process pertaining to the production of
photoengraving plates , plates for offset , plates for
gravure and gravure cylinders and plates of any
substance or material from copy or originals and-
/or subjects when furnished in lieu of copy up to
the finished product.
* * *
Should the Company install any equipment or
adopt any work processes designed as a substitute
for, or evolution of, work now being done by
photoengravers, the Company agrees to recognize
the jurisdiction of the GAIU over such equipment
and work processes.
The contract of the Stereotypers with the Employer
provides that:
It is mutually agreed that all processes of offset
plate-making , photo-polymer and all other forms
of photosensitive platemaking shall be within the
163
jurisdiction of the Chicago Stereotypers' Union
No. 4. The processes as mentioned above shall
include all operations relative to the manufacture
of offset plates , including camera , stripping, opa-
quers and pre-sensitized platemakers as known to
the offset process as well as all other operations
necessary for the preparation of offset printing
plates, including preparation of the finished plates
for press, E.G. curving, crimping or treating of all
plates for direct or offset printing.
Should the Employer install any equipment or
adopt any processes designed as a substitute for, or
evolution of, work now being- done by Stereoty-
pers , the Employer recognizes the jurisdiction of
the Chicago Stereotypers ' Union No . 4 over such
equipment and process and shall make no other
agreement covering such work.
We find that the jurisdictional clauses of both con-
tracts on their face appear to preserve the traditional
work performed by the employees represented by the
disputing labor organizations in their respective depart-
ments, and arguably , cover the disputed work . We fur-
ther find that neither of the contracts expressly covers
the work in dispute herein , the operation of the Meri-
graph Photo-Relief plate system . Therefore we cannot,
and do not, accord controlling weight to either of the
collective-bargaining agreements in making our deter-
mination.
Conclusion
Upon the record as a whole, and after full considera-
tion of all relevant factors involved, we conclude that
the Employer 's employees who are represented by the
Photoengravers are entitled to perform the work in
dispute . Although we have found that job impact
would tend to favor stereotypers , we do not find that
factor alone sufficient to outweigh those factors which
we have found favor assignment of the disputed work
to employees represented by the Photoengravers, in-
cluding the Employer's assignment and preference; the
area and industry practice , efficiency and economy of
operations, and relative skills. Accordingly, we shall
determine the dispute before us by awarding the dis-
puted work at the Employer's newspaper in Gary, In-
diana, to the Employer's employees represented by the
Photoengravers , but not to that Union or its members.
Our present determination is limited to the particular
controversy which gave rise to this proceeding.
164 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
DETERMINATION OF THE DISPUTE
Pursuant to Section 10(k) of the National Labor Re-
lations Act, as amended , and upon the basis of the
foregoing findings and the entire record in this proceed-
ing, the National Labor Relations Board hereby makes
the following Determination of Dispute:
Employees of The Post Tribune, a Division of North-
west Publications , Inc., Gary , Indiana, who are repre-
sented by Chicago Local 245, Graphic Arts Interna-
tional Union , AFL-CIO, are entitled to perform the
operation of a new machine and printing process
known as the Merigraph Photo-Relief plate system.