Graphic Communications Local 508M (S. Rosenthal)

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Dec 30, 1999

330 N.L.R.B. 405 (N.L.R.B. 1999)

GRAPHIC COMMUNICATIONS LOCAL 508M (S. ROSENTHAL & CO.) 405
Graphic Communication International Union, Local
508M, O-K-I, AFL–CIO and S. Rosenthal &
Company, Inc. and Truck Drivers, Chauffeurs
and Helpers, Local Union No. 100, an affiliate of
the International Brotherhood of Teamsters,
AFL–CIO. Case 9–CD–484
December 30, 1999
DECISION AND DETERMINATION OF DISPUTE
BY CHAIRMAN TRUESDALE AND MEMBERS LIEBMAN
AND BRAME
The charge in this Section 10(k) proceeding was filed
June 2, 1999, by S. Rosenthal & Company, Inc., the Em-
ployer, alleging that Graphic Communications Interna-
tional Union, Local 508M, O-K-I, AFL–CIO (GCIU),
violated Section 8(b)(4)(D) of the National Labor Rela-
tions Act by engaging in proscribed activity with an ob-
ject of forcing the Employer to assign certain work to
employees it represents rather than to employees repre-
sented by Truck Drivers, Chauffeurs and Helpers, Local
Union No. 100, an affiliate of the International Brother-
hood of Teamsters, AFL–CIO (Teamsters). The hearing
was held June 23, 1999, before Hearing Officer Ann
Marie Behrle.
The National Labor Relations Board has delegated its
authority in this proceeding to a three-member panel.
The Board affirms the hearing officer’s rulings, find-
ing them free from prejudicial error. On the entire re-
cord, the Board makes the following findings.
I. JURISDICTION
The parties stipulated, and we find, that the Employer,
an Ohio corporation, is engaged in the business of print-
ing catalogs and magazines and annually ships goods
valued in excess of $50,000 from its facility located at
Cincinnati, Ohio, to customers located outside the State
of Ohio. The parties also stipulated, and we find, that the
Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
Section 2(6) and (7) of the Act and that GCIU and Team-
sters are labor organizations within the meaning of Sec-
tion 2(5) of the Act.
II. THE DISPUTE
A. Background and Facts of the Dispute
The Employer prints catalogs and magazines at its fa-
cility located in Cincinnati, Ohio, where it has collective-
bargaining agreements with both GCIU and Teamsters.
GCIU represents the pressmen, who do all the printing
on the Web presses and the sheet-fed presses, and who
also do all the preparatory work to make the plates and
assemble the film for the presses. Teamsters represents
the material handlers, who handle and transport paper
and other materials throughout the facility. Each Un-
ion’s employees work all three shifts at the Employer’s
facility. The pressmen work in either the Web pressroom
or the sheet-fed pressroom. The material handlers work
in the front dock loading trucks; in the back dock area
unloading box cars; in the roll room stocking and inven-
torying all the paper rolls; in the baler room baling clip-
pings from the bindery and scrap material; and in the
maintenance room. The material handlers go into the
Web pressroom several times throughout their shifts to
place on the floor all the paper rolls that are to be run on
the presses, and to remove scrap such as the wrappers
that came off the outside of the rolls, the white waste that
was torn off the roll when the roll was prepped, and the
butt rolls that had already been stripped.
The 12 assistant pressmen load the paper rolls onto the
printing presses. They first remove the outer brown
wrapper around the paper roll and put that into a con-
tainer that holds the brown paper waste. They may strip
off a small amount of the outside white paper if it has
any deformities or nicks. Then they weigh that white
paper waste on scales which were installed at printing
presses in December 1998 or January 1999. Afterward,
they place the white paper waste in a separate container
from the brown paper. Once the paper roll nears comple-
tion going through the press, the assistant pressman stops
it so there is a 3/4- to 1-inch thickness of paper left on
the roll, as that part of the roll is not suitable for quality
printing.
In the 1970s, the remaining paper on the butt rolls was
removed either by the pressmen manually spinning the
white paper off the roll and throwing it into a container
(which a material handler later pulled out of the press-
room in order to dispose of the waste paper), or by the
material handlers collecting the butt rolls from the press-
room and taking them to a machine located in the roll
room known as the core slicer (a pneumatic-controlled
guillotine slicer) that would slice through the remaining
white paper. No one working for the Employer would
record the weight of the white waste paper; rather, an
outside recycling contractor would do that and would tell
the Employer what it weighed after loading it onto his
truck.
Starting in the mid-1980s, the Employer stopped using
the core slicer to separate the white waste paper from the
butt roll core, and simply shipped the intact butt rolls out
to a recycling contractor. In 1998, the Employer hired a
consulting firm, which recommended identifying the
white paper waste with the particular jobs being run for
cost accounting purposes, and having the white waste
paper separated and weighed in-house rather than ship-
ping it to outside contractors. In order to perform this
work in-house, the Employer purchased the core stripper
machines in late 1998 or early January 1999.
The core stripper machines are located next to the
printing presses. The butt roll is placed on the core strip-
per machine and the machine automatically unwinds the
paper off the end of the core. The Employer assigned the
task of operating the core stripper machines to the assis-
tant pressmen, who take the butt roll from the press ma-
330 NLRB No. 59
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD 406
chine and place it on the core stripper; once the paper is
unwound, the pressman slides the roll out of the core
stripper and takes the shaft and places the next roll of
paper on it. While the core stripper is unwinding the
paper, the pressman can perform other duties, such as
preparing his next roll of paper. Once the paper is un-
wound on the core stripper, the pressman removes the
white waste paper from the stripper, puts it on the adja-
cent scale and records the weight of the waste paper, and
then puts the waste paper into a waste bin.1 For each
printing job, the pressman enters the weight of the butt
roll white waste paper on a form, on which he has also
entered the roll number, the beginning weight of the roll,
the weight of the initial white paper waste, and his ini-
tials.
On January 20, 1999, Teamsters filed a grievance pro-
testing the Employer’s assignment of the work of strip-
ping the waste paper off the butt rolls to employees rep-
resented by GCIU. Teamsters requested that such prac-
tice be stopped and the work be assigned to employees it
represented. In response to this grievance, John Agen-
broad, GCIU’s executive vice president, notified the
Employer by letter dated May 18, 1999, that GCIU did
not intend to relinquish the work described by the griev-
ance and would take whatever action was necessary to
preserve its jurisdiction, including a strike.
B. Work in Dispute
The disputed work consists of the assignment of the
operation of core stripper machines, inserting the butt
rolls into the core stripper machines and stripping the
waste paper from the cores.
C. Contentions of the Parties
The parties waived the filing of briefs. The Employer
contends that the disputed work should be awarded to the
pressmen represented by GCIU based on its collective-
bargaining agreement with GCIU, economy and effi-
ciency of operations, industry practice, and employer
preference. GCIU agrees with the Employer that the
work should be awarded to the pressmen. GCIU con-
tends that the work in dispute is an auxiliary function of
the pressroom, and that it has exclusive jurisdiction over
such work in accord with its collective-bargaining
agreement with the Employer.
Teamsters contends that the disputed work should be
awarded to the material handlers it represents, based on
its collective-bargaining agreement with the Employer
and on the Employer’s past practice, and consistent with
the material handlers’ classification.
D. Applicability of the Statute
Before the Board may proceed with a determination of
a dispute pursuant to Section 10(k) of the Act, it must be
satisfied that there is reasonable cause to believe that

1 A material handler enters the pressroom several times during each
shift in order to take out the waste bins.
Section 8(b)(4)(D) has been violated and that the parties
have not agreed on a method for the voluntary adjust-
ment of the dispute.
It is undisputed that in response to information that
Teamsters had filed a grievance protesting the assign-
ment of the work in dispute to the pressmen, GCIU noti-
fied the Employer by letter dated May 18, 1999, that it
would take whatever action necessary to preserve its ju-
risdiction, including a strike. We find that this threat is
sufficient to establish reasonable cause to believe that
Section 8(b)(4)(D) has been violated. The parties stipu-
lated that there exists no agreed-on method for voluntary
adjustment of the dispute which would be binding on all
the parties within the meaning of Section 10(k) of the
Act. Accordingly, we find that the dispute is properly
before the Board for determination.
E. Merits of the Dispute
Section 10(k) requires the Board to make an affirma-
tive award of disputed work after considering various
factors. NLRB v. Electrical Workers IBEW Local 1212
(Columbia Broadcasting), 364 U.S. 573 (1961). The
Board has held that its determination in a jurisdictional
dispute is an act of judgment based on common sense
and experience, reached by balancing the factors in-
volved in a particular case. Machinists Lodge 1743 (J .A.
Jones Construction), 135 NLRB 1402 (1962).
The following factors are relevant in making the de-
termination of this dispute.
1. Certifications and collective-bargaining agreements
The parties stipulated that neither Union is the certified
bargaining representative of a unit of the Employer’s
employees. The Employer has collective-bargaining
agreements with both GCIU and Teamsters, and each
Union claims that its most recent contract covers the
work in dispute.
The work jurisdiction of GCIU is set forth in article 3
of its 1995–1999 collective-bargaining agreement with
the Employer. Article 3 provides in relevant part:

[J]urisdiction of this contract extends over all printing
presses operated in said pressrooms and all production
equipment used in the pre-press department. All pro-
duction work traditionally performed by these depart-
ments shall be the jurisdiction of the Union, regardless
of the means, methods, or equipment used in the pro-
duction process, including but not limited to, all pro-
duction work in connection with the capturing and re-
producing images, manipulation of images, proofing,
plate making, and press operation.

The work jurisdiction of Teamsters is set forth at arti-
cle 2 of its 1995–1999 collective-bargaining agreement
with the Employer. Article 2 provides in relevant part:

The jurisdiction of the Union shall include the work
performed by the employees on classifications listed in
GRAPHIC COMMUNICATIONS LOCAL 508M (S. ROSENTHAL & CO.) 407
Article 8 (Wages) of this Agreement, including mate-
rial handling, paper bailing, electrical work, dock re-
ceiving, clerical work, roll stockkeeping, forklift work,
roll truck work, all loading of boxcars, and truck and
paper compactors.

Article 11 of the same agreement provides that “[T]he
Company shall maintain all prevailing working condi-
tions, benefits and past practices at the highest level ex-
isting at the effective date of this Agreement.”
The Board will rely on contract provisions if the as-
signment of the work is made in clear and unambiguous
terms in those provisions. Teamsters Local 470 (Philco-
Ford Corp.), 203 NLRB 592, 594 (1973). That is not the
case with the provisions relied on by either GCIU or
Teamsters. Neither article 3 of the GCIU contract nor
article 2 of the Teamsters contract expressly refers to the
work in dispute in this proceeding. Article 2 of the
Teamsters contract describes jurisdiction in terms of job
functions and job classifications. The listed job func-
tions do not expressly cover the work in dispute. In addi-
tion, Teamsters failed to produce any job descriptions
which specifically identify the work in dispute among the
listed duties for the material handlers or any other classi-
fications represented by it. Furthermore, article 11 of the
Teamsters contract regarding prevailing working condi-
tions and past practices does not clearly and unambigu-
ously grant the Teamsters-represented employees juris-
diction over the work in dispute, because it refers to past
practices “existing at the effective date of this Agree-
ment,” which is November 25, 1995. The Employer had
not performed the work in dispute since the mid-1980s,
before resuming it in late 1998 or early 1999, and thus
the disputed work does not appear to constitute a “past
practice” as specified in article 11.
Accordingly, as neither collective-bargaining agree-
ment clearly and unambiguously covers the work in dis-
pute, and this factor does not favor an award of the work
to either group of employees.
2. Employer preference and past practice
The record shows that since late December 1998 or
early January 1999, when the Employer resumed per-
forming the work in dispute, its preference and consistent
practice has been to use pressmen represented by GCIU
to perform the work in dispute. Thus, the factor of Em-
ployer preference favors an award of the work to em-
ployees represented by GCIU.
The record also shows that from the 1970s until the
mid-1980s, material handlers represented by Teamsters
were primarily responsible for collecting the butt rolls
from the pressroom and taking them to the core slicer
machine, which would slice through the remaining white
paper on the butt roll.2 Some of the butt roll cores were

2 During this time, it was also not uncommon for the pressmen
manually to unwind the remaining paper off the butt roll.
made of metal and could not be put into the core slicer,
and for those the material handlers would remove the
white waste paper by hand. The material handlers would
then place the white waste paper into a container without
weighing it. Teamsters argue that when the Employer
resumed performing the work of removing the white
waste paper off the butt rolls, it should have assigned this
work to the material handlers that it represents because
they performed similar work, using the core slicer, before
the Employer switched to the outside recycling contrac-
tor.
We reject this argument because of various changes
made by the Employer when it resumed performing the
work of removing the white waste paper off the butt rolls
in-house in late December 1998 or early January 1999.
Specifically, the Employer no longer uses the core slicer
to perform this work, but instead now uses the core strip-
per machines to perform the work. The core slicer was a
pneumatic-controlled guillotine slicer that would come
down and slice through the remaining white paper on the
butt roll, and a material handler would then pull the pa-
per off the roll. In contrast, with the core stripper ma-
chine, an employee slides the butt roll onto a cantilever,
starts a piece of paper down on the bottom roller, flicks a
switch which turns on a driver with a small motor, and
then the machine automatically unwinds the paper off the
core. In addition, the core slicer machines were located
in the roll room, whereas the core stripper machines are
located in the pressrooms adjacent to the printing
presses. The Employer has also added another task to
this job. The pressman now weighs the white paper butt
roll waste on a scale attached to the printing press, and
records that weight on a specific form (on which the
pressman has also entered the roll number, the beginning
weight of the roll, the weight of the initial white paper
waste, and his initials). Before, the material handlers did
not record the weight of the white paper butt roll waste.
Thus, we find that the factor of past practice favors nei-
ther group of employees.
3. Economy and efficiency of operations
The Employer contends that it is more economical and
efficient to assign the work in dispute to the pressmen
represented by GCIU. According to the Employer, the
pressmen are physically present in the pressroom where
the core stripper machine is located and thus they can
perform other tasks while waiting for this machine to
finish unwinding the paper, and the pressmen can more
easily track and weigh the amount of white waste being
generated by each roll of paper, and record that informa-
tion (as well as the roll number, the beginning weight of
the roll, the weight of the initial white paper waste, and
the pressman’s initials) on the required forms maintained
at the presses. The Employer’s supporting evidence
shows that no additional staffing was required when it
assigned the disputed work to the pressmen. The Em-
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD 408
ployer also presented testimony from James Brown, the
Employer’s vice president and general manager, and Ge-
rald MacDonald, the Employer’s plant manager, that if
the work in dispute were assigned to the material han-
dlers represented by Teamsters, it would be necessary to
have one or two of those employees just standing around
the pressroom, contrary to current practice, to be present
to operate the core strippers and to weigh and record the
generated white waste, or the Employer would have to
summon them from another area of the plant and wait
until they arrived before proceeding with the production
process. Brown also testified that having to hire one or
two additional material handlers would probably cause
the Employer to reevaluate its current system of handling
the white paper waste.
Teamsters argue that it is just as efficient and eco-
nomical to use the material handlers to perform the dis-
puted work. Steve Mills, who currently works as a mate-
rial handler for the Employer, testified that the material
handlers responsible for removing the waste bins con-
taining the paper waste from the pressroom spend ap-
proximately 1-1/2 hours per shift in the pressroom. Mills
testified that he thought the material handlers could per-
form the disputed work and track what job and what
press a butt roll came from if the rolls for each job were
segregated in their own boxes. Mills also suggested that
if there was a way to identify the roll number on the butt
roll, this would enable the material handlers to remove
the butt rolls from the pressroom and still track the roll
number for each roll. Mills further explained that even
under the present system, he sometimes sees three or four
butt rolls allowed to accumulate before the pressmen
place them on the core stripper machines. Mills indi-
cated that the fairly lightweight core strippers are port-
able and need not be physically attached to the presses,
but could be moved to a more accessible location for the
material handlers.
The Employer’s above evidence reveals the following
advantages in having the pressmen perform the work in
dispute: they are physically present where the core strip-
per machines are located, they can perform other duties
while the core stripper machine unwinds the paper, and
they can easily track and record the weight of white
waste paper being generated with each print job. Be-
cause the core stripper machines require only intermittent
attention, it would be more disruptive to the Employer’s
operations for a material handler to interrupt his duties
outside the pressroom to come in and oversee the ma-
chine than for the pressmen working nearby to attend to
it. Also, the hiring of additional workers would proba-
bly be needed if the material handlers performed the
work. While Mills testified for Teamsters that he
thought the material handlers could perform the work as
efficiently as the pressmen, his suggestions for enabling
the material handlers to perform the work appear to cre-
ate extra steps for the Employer in performing the work.
Mills offered these alternatives—segregating the rolls in
separate boxes and identifying roll numbers on the butt
rolls—that create additional work and run the added risk
of possible confusion if a roll were not properly segre-
gated or marked. Thus, based on the above evidence, we
find that the factor of economy and efficiency of opera-
tions favors an award of the work to employees repre-
sented by GCIU.
4. Area and industry practice
The Employer concedes that it is not aware of any lo-
cal printing companies that use core stripper machines.
However, it asserts that several national companies per-
form similar work with the core stripper machines.
Based on hearsay information, the Employer believes
that the pressmen perform the work at those national
companies that are unionized. The Employer, however,
does not know if those companies have material handlers
or if they have material handlers that are represented by
Teamsters or another union. Therefore, there is no indi-
cation that two groups of employees, like the instant
situation, have claimed or competed for the same kind of
work. Thus, there is no evidence of either area or indus-
try practice on this record. Accordingly, we find that this
factor does not favor an award to either group of em-
ployees.
5. Relative skills
The Employer contends that employees represented by
both Unions possess the necessary skills to perform the
work in dispute, as it requires no special skills. Team-
sters asserts that no special skills are needed to perform
the disputed work and that either the pressmen or the
material handlers could do the job. Because there is no
evidence that specialized skills are needed to perform the
disputed work, this factor does not favor an award to
either group of employees.
Conclusion
After considering all the relevant factors, we conclude
that the employees represented by GCIU are entitled to
perform the work in dispute. We reach this conclusion
relying on the factors of employer preference and econ-
omy and efficiency of operations. In making this deter-
mination, we are awarding the work to employees repre-
sented by GCIU, not to that Union or its members. The
present determination is limited to the particular contro-
versy that gave rise to this proceeding.
DETERMINATION OF DISPUTE
The National Labor Relations Board makes the follow-
ing Determination of Dispute.
GRAPHIC COMMUNICATIONS LOCAL 508M (S. ROSENTHAL & CO.) 409
Employees of S. Rosenthal & Company, Inc., repre-
sented by Graphic Communications International Union,
Local 508M, O-K-I, AFL–CIO, are entitled to perform
the work of operating the core stripper machines, insert-
ing the butt rolls into the core stripper machines and
stripping the waste paper from the cores, at its Cincin-
nati, Ohio facility.