George Washington University

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 14, 1971

191 N.L.R.B. 151 (N.L.R.B. 1971)

GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY 151
George Washington University and Retail Stores Em-
ployees Union, Local No. 400, Retail Clerks Inter-
national Association, AFL-CIO, Petitioner. Case 5-
RC-7410
June 14, 1971
DECISION AND ORDER
BY CHAIRMAN MILLER AND MEMBERS FANNING
AND JENKINS
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of the
National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a hearing
was held before Hearing Officer William I. Shooer.
Following the hearing, and pursuant to Section 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 5, this case was transferred to the National
Labor Relations Board for decision. Both the Em-
ployer and the Petitioner have 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 powers
in connection 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 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 repre-
sent certain employees of the Employer.
3. No question affecting commerce exists concerning
the representation of certain employees of the Em-
ployer within the meaning of Section 9(c)(1) and Sec-
tion 2(6) and (7) of the Act.
The Employer, George Washington University,' is
the second largest employer in the District of Co-
lumbia. The Employer has about 6,000 employees of
whom approximately 2,800 are classified as nonaca-
demic, nonsupervisory employees. The Employer has
had contracts with another union covering at least
some of the nonacademic employees in a university-
wide unit since 1946. The Petitioner seeks a unit com-
posed of all regular, full-time and part-time employees
and all temporary employees employed in the Em-
ployer's bookstore, excluding all other employees,
professional employees, guards and supervisors as
defined in the Act. The Employer contends that the
appropriate unit should consist of all the service and
clerical employees employed by the Employer. The
Employer further contends that if the employees in the
bookstore are found to be an appropriate unit the tem-
porary employees should be excluded because their em-
ployment is casual in nature.
The Employer's bookstore is located in the Univer-
sity Center building which is described as the center of
university activity. In addition to the bookstore the
building contains a food service operation, parking ga-
rage, study lounge, meeting rooms, conference rooms,
bowling alley, billiard rooms, music room, and other
functions to serve the students and staff of the Univer-
sity. The bookstore is intended for the use of university
personnel although no precautions are taken to prevent
nonuniversity personnel from making use of the book-
store's services. About 85 percent of the sales made in
the bookstore consist of textbooks required or recom-
mended by an instructor or professor of the University.
The remaining sales are of jewelry, supplies, such as
pencils, paper, and notebooks, T-shirts, jackets, and
other clothing imprinted with the University's initials,
gift items, cosmetics, cigarettes, books in both paper-
back and hard cover, currently popular, and other
items which students are likely to buy. The bookstore
advertises its merchandise in various university publi-
cations. According to the policy manual governing the
bookstore,' the bookstore is expected to make a profit
which is to be paid to the University in lieu of rent.
The University provides the bookstore with utilities
such as heat, light, air conditioning, and telephone ser-
vice and provides janitorial, guard, and mail service
either through its own employees or by contracting out
the work. These services are included in the rental. All
accounting and payroll functions are performed by the
University for the bookstore, including the payment of
the employees.
The budget for the bookstore is initially prepared by
the bookstore. It must then be approved by the Univer-
sity's business manager, who supervises all of the facili-
ties in the University Center. Thereafter it must be
approved by the University's vice, president and treas-
urer who forwards it to the University's budget com-
mitted. After approval by that body it is then submitted
to the University's board of trustees as a part of the
University's overall budget. The budgets of the other
departments and facilities of the University are ap-
proved in the same manner.
The regular full- and part-time employees in the
bookstore are classified and paid in accordance with a
universitywide wage classification scale administered
by the University's personnel office for all nonacademic
employees. The personnel office also administers all
fringe benefits for all employees, including those em-
ployed in the bookstore, as well as such working condi-
' Sometimes referred to herein as the University.
191 NLRB No. 39
' The bookstore is the only unit of the University with its own policy
manual.
152 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
tions as vacation time and sick leave. The personnel
files of all employees, except those working at the uni-
versity hospital, are maintained by the university per-
sonnel office.
Regular full- and part-time employees, including
those in the bookstore, are hired through the university
personnel office. When notified that a vacancy exists in
a department or facility the personnel office recruits
and interviews employees, both from within and with-
out the University, checks their references, and deter-
mines whether an individual is qualified for the va-
cancy. The head of the department or facility then
interviews the prospective employee and, if mutually
agreeable, makes an offer of employment. The appli-
cant then returns to the university personnel office for
processing.'
Discharges are effectuated by the bookstore
manager. Very often the discharge is after consultation
with the personnel office to make certain that the per-
son is given fair and objective consideration. Notifica-
tion and consultation with the personnel office also
enables that office to consider placing the individual in
another job in the University. Grievances are handled
by the bookstore's supervisor and bookstore manager
with a final appeal to either the director of auxiliary
services or the personnel office.
Employees receive step increases based upon length
of service but the bookstore manager has no power to
change the job classification of the employee. Em-
ployees desiring promotions must therefore transfer to
other departments and facilities of the University. This
has resulted in a substantial interchange of employees
in and out of the bookstore. Thus in the year from
September 1969 to September 1970, there were 8 per-
manent transfers in the proposed unit of 20 employees.
In Cornell University' we stated the criteria which
would govern our determination of the appropriateness
of units in these cases. There we said:
In determining whether a particular group of
employees constitutes an appropriate unit for bar-
gaining where an employer operates a number of
Temporary employees are generally students who are hired by the
bookstore manager They are hired for an indefinite period to assist the
various departments and facilities at times when the workload is particularly
heavy. Their wage scale differs from that of regular employees and they
receive no fringe benefits. They are required to go through personnel office
procedures after they have been offered employment, however.
1 183 NLRB No. 41.
facilities, the Board considers such factors as prior
bargaining history, centralization of management
particularly in regard to labor relations, extent of
employee interchange, degree of interdependence
or autonomy of the plants, differences or similari-
ties in skills and functions of the employees, and
geographical location of the facilities in relation to
each other. We are mindful that we are entering
into a hitherto uncharted area. Nevertheless, we
regard the above principles as reliable guides to
organization in the educational context as they
have been in the industrial, and will apply them to
the circumstances of the instant case.
Applying these criteria to the instant case it is evi-
dent that the unit of bookstore employees requested by
the Petitioner is inappropriate. Prior bargaining history
has been, except for hospital employees, on a universi-
tywide basis. Management is highly centralized, not
only with respect to budgetary matters, but also with
respect to the recruitment and classification of all
nonacademic employees of the University and the ad-
ministration of all personnel matters pertaining to
them. The record shows that there is substantial inter-
change of employees between the bookstore and other
university facilities due, at least in part, to the fact that
the skills and functions of the bookstore employees are
similar to those working elsewhere in the University.
Finally, although the bookstore possesses some au-
tonomy in its day-to-day operations and engages in
some minor commercial activities, the record makes it
clear that the bookstore is both by its location and by
its function a closely integrated segment of the Univer-
sity's operation as an institution of higher learning. We
therefore find that the employees of the bookstore do
not have a community of interest sufficiently separate
and distinct from other nonacademic employees to jus-
tify the creation of a separate unit for them.' Accord-
ingly we shall dismiss the petition.'
ORDER
It is hereby ordered that the petition filed herein be,
and it hereby is, dismissed.
Yale University, 184 NLRB No. 101.
Because of the dismissal of the petition on the grounds that the basic
unit is inappropriate we need not decide whether temporary employees are
properly included in the unit