Crown Zellerbach Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Dec 28, 1949

87 N.L.R.B. 1324 (N.L.R.B. 1949)

In the Matter of CROWN ZELLERBACII COMPANY, EMPLOYER and
CHAUFFEURS, TEAMSTERS AND HELPERS, LOCAL UNION No . 589,.
INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS, CHAUFFEURS, WARE
HOUSEMEN & HELPERS OF AMERICA, AFL, PETITIONER
Case No. 19-RC-316.-Decided December 28,1949
DECISION
AND
ORDER
Upon a petition duly filed, a hearing was held before Melton Boyd,
hearing officer. 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, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the National Labor Relations Act.
2. The Petitioner and the Intervenor,' Local 2-90, International
Woodworkers of America, CIO, are labor organizations claiming to
represent employees of the Employer.
3. No question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa-
tion of 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 sever a unit of seven logging and eight dump
truck drivers from the over-all unit currently represented by the Inter-
venor. The Employer and the Intervenor oppose this severance, con-
tending that the existing over-all unit is the only one appropriate for
collective bargaining.
The Employer is engaged in the manufacture of paper and paper
products and operates a pulp mill at Port Angeles, Washington. The
pulp mill obtains part of its pulp wood supply from the Employer's
logging operations at Neah Bay in northern Washington. Only the
employees at Neah Bay are involved in this case. At this logging site
the Employer employs about 200 men in various phases of logging
I The Intervenor was allowed to intervene at the hearing on the basis of its current con-
tract with the Employer covering the employees herein involved. None of the parties
contends that this contract is a bar to the instant petition.
87 NLRB No. 140.
1324
CROWN ZELLERBACH COMPANY 1325
from the building of logging roads to the rafting of logs in the water.
The Employer maintains houses and a camp at Neah Bay for its em-
ployees and their families. The Employer's operations are seasonal,
with operations extending over a period of 7 to 8 months of the year.
The facts in this case with respect to the Employer's operations and
the duties of the truck drivers sought to be represented by the Peti-
tioner are in all material respects substantially similar to those before
us in the Nettleton Timber Company case.2 Here, as in that case, the
record reveals that the jobs of the truck drivers comprise an essential
phase of a highly integrated logging operation, and are performed in
close coordination with other jobs in the continuous process of lumber
production under common supervision 3 The record further shows
that the truck drivers are capable of performing and are called upon
to perform a wide variety of logging tasks other than truck driving.
Here as in the Nettleton case, the truck drivers work under conditions,
and enjoy employee benefits, common to other logging employees, and
the continuous history of bargaining since 1935 has been on an indus-
trial basis, embracing in a single unit substantially all the Employer's
Neah Bay employees 4
On these facts, and for the reasons set forth in the Nettleton and in
the Weyerhaeuser Timber Company r, cases we believe that separate
units of truck drivers are inappropriate for collective bargaining in
the lumber industry.
Accordingly, as we have found the unit requested by the Petitioner
inappropriate, we shall dismiss the petition.
ORDER
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the petition herein be, and it hereby is,
dismissed.
MEMBER MuRDOCK took no part in the consideration of the above
Decision and Order.
' Nettleton Timber Company , 87 NLRB 1319.
' In this case , unlike the Nettleton case, the log truck drivers are technically under the
jurisdiction of a "truck foreman ." The record establishes , however , that this truck fore-
man in fact acts as a truck dispatcher rather than a supervisor of the work performed by
the log truck drivers. Nor does he possess authority to change the employment status of
these drivers , or effectively to recommend such action . As in the Nettleton case, when the
log truck driver is at the loading station he is under the supervision of the hook tender
who is also in charge of the loading crew.
' Boom men have been separately represented . This isolated exception , however, seems
to have been the result of unusual circumstances rather than any important deviations
from the pattern of industrial bargaining in the lumber industry.
5 Weyerhaeuser Timber Company , 87 NLRB 1076, issued December 16, 1949.