Los Angeles Tile Jobbers, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

May 21, 1974

210 N.L.R.B. 789 (N.L.R.B. 1974)

LOS ANGELES TILE JOBBERS , INC. 789
Los Angeles Tile Jobbers, Inc. and Rene Castillo,
Employee-Petitioner and General Warehousemen's
Local #598, International Brotherhood of Team-
sters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen and Helpers of
America, Union . Case 31-RD-246
May 21, 1974
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 Renato
Della Rocca on January 29, 1974. Following the
hearing, pursuant to Section 102.67 of the National
Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations and
Statements of Procedure, Series 8, as amended, this
proceeding was transferred to the National Labor
Relations Board for decision. None of the parties
filed a brief.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the
National Labor Relations Act, as amended, the
National Labor Relations Board has delegated its
authority in this proceeding 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. The rulings 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 Act and it will effectuate the
purposes of the Act to assert jurisdiction herein.
2. The petition asserts that the Union therein
named, a labor organization, is no longer the
representative, as defined in Section 9(a) of the Act,
of the employees designated in the petition.
3. No question affecting commerce exists con-
cerning 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, for the following
reasons.
The Employer and the Union have had a bargain-
ing relationship which resulted in a contract executed
on July 31, 1970, for a 3-year period with a terminal
date of July 31, 1973. Prior to July 31, 1973, a request
for modification of the agreement was received by
the Employer from the Union.
On June 18, 1973, the Union filed an unfair labor
practice charge in Case 31-CA-3823, alleging that
the Employer unlawfully refused to bargain in
violation of Section 8(a)(5) of the Act, and that the
Employer violated Section 8(a)(1) of the Act by
interfering with and undermining the Union's major-
ity status. The 8(a)(1) allegation was based on the
Employer's alleged individual bargaining and state-
ments to employees, urging them to give up the
Union.
In a letter dated August 8, 1973, to the Board's
Regional Office, the Employer promised to bargain
in good faith and not to challenge the Union's
majority status. Accordingly, the charge was amend-
ed on August 13, 1973, to delete the allegations
concerning Section 8(a)(5). With respect to the
outstanding 8(a)(1) allegations, the Regional Office
approved a bilateral informal settlement agreement
on August 31, 1973. The usual notice was posted and
the record indicates that the posting period ended on
November 8, 1973. In the interim, a decertification
petition in Case 31-RD-232, filed on August 20,
1973, was dismissed administratively. An appeal was
taken to the Board, which on October 9, 1973,
affirmed the Regional Director's dismissal of the
petition. The instant decertification petition was filed
on December 12, 1973.
At the hearing herein, the Union took the position
that the instant petition should be dismissed on the
grounds that a reasonable period of time within
which to bargain for and reach a new contract had
not elapsed following the Employer's agreement to
bargain in good faith and the approval of the
settlement agreement. We agree.
In this case, approximately 4 months had elapsed
from the date of the Employer's letter in which it
agreed to bargain in good faith, to the date the
petition was filed. Even less time had elapsed from
the date of the settlement agreement to the date the
petition was filed. Although the parties were meeting
throughout this period, the bargaining was clouded
by an earlier decertification petition, finally dis-
missed on October 9, 1973, and the notice-posting
period, which expired approximately I month prior
to the date of the petition herein. In these circum-
stances, we conclude that a reasonable time for
collective bargaining had not elapsed since the
settlement of the unfair labor practice charges.
Accordingly, we shall dismiss the petition.'
ORDER
It is hereby ordered that the petition filed in Case
31-RD-246 by Rene Castillo be, and it hereby is,
dismissed.
Poole Foundry and Machine Company, 95 NLRB 34, enfd 192 F 2d
740 (C A 4), cert denied 342 US 954, Dick Brothers, Inc, 110 NLRB
451
210 NLRB No. 144