Convalescent Center of Honolulu

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Dec 16, 1969

180 N.L.R.B. 461 (N.L.R.B. 1969)

DIVERSIFIED HEALTH SERVICES 461
Diversified Health Services , Inc. d/b/a Convalescent
Center of Honolulu ,' Employer-Petitioner and
Hawaii Nurses Association , Inc. Case 37-RM-76
December 16, 1969
DECISION AND DIRECTION OF
ELECTION
BY CHAIRMAN MCCULLOCH AND MEMBERS
JENKINS AND ZAGORIA
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of
the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a
hearing was held before Wilma K. Tice, Hearing
Officer of the National Labor Relations Board.
Following the hearing and pursuant to Section
102.67 of the National Labor Relations Board Rules
and Regulations, Series 8, as amended, by direction
of the Regional Director for Region 20, the case
was transferred to the Board for decision.
Thereafter, the parties filed briefs with the Board.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the
Act, the Board has delegated its powers in
connection with this case to a three-member panel.
The Hearing Officer 's rulings made at the hearing
are free from prejudicial error and are hereby
affirmed.
Upon the entire record in this case, including the
briefs filed herein, the Board finds:
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within
the meaning of the Act and it will effectuate the
policies of the Act to assert jurisdiction herein.
2. The labor organization involved claims to
represent certain employees of the Employer.
3. A question affecting commerce exists
concerning 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.
4. The appropriate unit.
Hawaii Nurses Association, Inc., (hereinafter
called the Union) seeks a unit of all registered
nurses employed at the Employer's Honolulu,
Hawaii, nursing home; excluding clerical employees,
supervisors, technicians, guards and/or watchmen,
as defined in the Act, and all other employees. Both
parties agree that the registered nurses are
professionals and that a unit of professionals is
proper. However, contrary to the Union, the
Employer-Petitioner contends that all the registered
nurses are supervisors within the meaning of Section
2(11) of the Act and that such a unit could not,
therefore, be appropriate under Section 9(b). For the
reasons stated below, we find no merit in this
contention.
The Employer' s nursing home is run by an
administrator under whom serves a director of
nursing. Both of the foregoing are agreed by the
parties to be supervisors. Under the director of
The name of the Employer appears as amended at the hearing
nursing, who is also a registered nurse, are 15 full
and part-time registered nurses (hereinafter called
RN's) and 2 licensed practical nurses, all of whom
function as charge nurses; and approximately 28
nurses aides.'
The nursing home has 160 beds, and is split up
into 4 units and operates on 3 shifts. The record
indicates that there is a full or part-time RN or
LPN in charge of each unit on each shift.
The registered nurses are a highly trained group
of professionals who normally inform other, lesser
skilled, employees as to the work to be performed
for patients and insure that such work is done. Their
duties consist of administering medication and
treatments to patients and keeping patient medical
charts. In addition, starting about mid-June, they
prepare weekly work schedules' for the aides;
however, the evening shift scheduling is done by the
Director of Nursing.4 Prior to mid-June, all the
scheduling was done by the Director of Nursing.
The RN's also prepare an annual evaluation of aides
on their units, and a similar evaluation at the end of
the new employee probationary period. Both the
present and past Director of Nursing made
independent investigations before taking any
personnel action, including transfers, promotions
and discharges, although the RN's evaluations may
also be considered as one of many factors in taking
such action.
The Director of Nursing interviews and hires all
employees, schedules vacations, keeps time records
of aides, handles grievances and grants overtime.5
Although she works only 5 days a week from 7 a.m.
to 3:30 p.m., the record reveals that she is available
at home and frequently called by the RN's when
any problem above the ordinary occurs.
The full time RN's work a 40-hour week, are paid
on a monthly basis broken down to an hourly scale,
and punch a timeclock. The record reveals that the
authority over the aides working with them is quite
limited. They do not have the authority to hire,
discharge, transfer, promote, or reward, nor can
they effectively recommend any such action. While
the RN's do schedule and assign work to aides,
there is no evidence in the record that they do so in
a manner requiring the exercise of independent
judgment. Finally, the disciplining of the aides as
well as releasing them from work, granting them
overtime and transferring them among the units are
all matters which are handled by the Director of
'All employees of the hospital excluding supervisors, guards and
professionals are represented by the United Public Workers Union (UPW)
which was certified in Case 37-RC-1454 on October 3, 1968 According to
the uncontradicted testimony of the Employer the two licensed practical
nurses are under the coverage of the present collective - bargaining
agreement between the Employer and UPW
'The LPN's functioning as charge nurses also prepare these work
schedules
'The Director of Nursing prior to assuming her present position was the
evening supervisor At the time of the hearing there was no evening
supervisor
'If the RN's have to work overtime for more than 30 minutes the
Director of Nursing must approve it
180 NLRB No. 26
462 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Nursing.
Upon all of the foregoing, we conclude that the
registered nurses are not supervisors within the
meaning of Section 2(11) of the Act.
Accordingly, we find that the following employees
of the Employer constitute a unit appropriate for
the purposes of collective bargaining within the
meaning of Section 9(b) of the Act:
All registered nurses of the Employer employed
at its Honolulu, Hawaii, nursing home; excluding
clerical employees, technicians, supervisors, and
guards and/or watchmen as defined in the Act,
and all other employees.
[Direction of Election ' omitted from publication.]
'In order to assure that all eligible voters may have the opportunity to
be informed of the issues in the exercise of their statutory right to vote, all
parties to the election should have access to a list of voters and their
addresses which may be used to communicate with them Excelsior
Underwear Inc. 156 NLRB 1236; N.L R.B. v Wyman-Gordon Company.
394 U.S 759 Accordingly, it is hereby directed that an election eligibility
list, containing the names and addresses of all the eligible voters, must be
filed by the Employer with the Regional Director for Region 20 within 7
days of the date of this Decision and Direction of Election The Regional
Director shall make the list available to all parties to the election. No
extension of time to file this list shall be granted by the Regional Director
except in extraordinary circumstances Failure to comply with this
requirement shall be grounds for setting aside the election whenever proper
objections are filed