Owen Steel Co., Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jan 15, 1951

92 N.L.R.B. 1334 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

In the Matter. of OWEN STEEL COMPANY, INC., EMPLOYER and SHOP-
MEN'S LOCAL UNION No. 616, INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF BRIDGE,
STRUCTURAL AND ORNAMENTAL 4IRON WORKERS , AFL, PETITIONER
Case No. 10-RC-1093.-Decided January 15,1951
DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION
:.Upon apetition duly filed under Section 9 ( c) of the National
Labor : Relations Act, a hearing was held before Clarence D. Musser,
hearing : officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are
free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
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 [Chairman Herzog and Members Reynolds and Murdock].
Upon the entire record in this case , the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of the
Act.
2, The labor organization involved claims to represent certain em-
ployees of the. Employer.
3; A 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.
4. The appropriate unit :
The' parties agree as to the appropriateness of a plant -wide unit,
excluding office clerical and professional employees , guards, and super-
visors. However, the Petitioner claims, contrary to the contention
of the Employer, that Willard Hughes, W. D. McDonald , and Ran-
dolph Meetz, should be excluded from the unit as supervisors.
The Employer is engaged in the fabrication and sale of structural
and reinforcing steel , iron, and allied products at its plant in Colum-
bia, South Carolina . F. D. Owen, the Employer 's president and
treasurer , and 2 graduate engineers personally supervise all produc-
tion and sales activity. At the time of the hearing , there were approxi-
mately 42 shop employees in the proposed unit.
Owen or one of the engineers allocates material to the shop to fill
orders in accordance with blueprints prepared in the drafting room,'
' The parties agree, and we find, that the Employer's five draftsmen are professional
.,employees who should , therefore , be excluded from the unit.
92 NLRB No. 201.
1334
OWEN STEEL COMPANY, INC. 1335
and also determines the order in which work is to be done. The
fabrication work in the shop, a large open area, is done by 3 groups
of approximately 10 employees each.2 Hughes and one of these
groups do reinforcing steel work at one end of the shop, McDonald
and a second group perform welding operations in the middle sec-
tion, and Meetz and the third group punch structural beams and do
miscellaneous fabrication work at the other end of the shop. Hughes,
McDonald, and Meetz are among the oldest and most skilled em-
ployees in the shop. Each of the 3 works with tools and machines
along with the other employees in the group, and this work takes
up the greater part of their time. None of the 3 has authority to
hire, discharge, transfer, or discipline employees, or to recommend
such action. It is clear from the record that all such personnel mat-
ters are exclusively handled by Owen and the 2 engineers.
Hughes, McDonald, and Meetz function as group leaders because
of their greater experience and skill, but have none of the normal
indicia of supervisory authority. Their direction of the work of the
lesser skilled employees in their groups does not involve the exercise
of independent judgment. The shop work is all planned by Owen
and the engineers, of whom at least one is generally in the shop per-
sonally to supervise the production employees. Under these circum-
stances, we find that Hughes, McDonald, and Meetz are not supervisors
as defined in Section 2 (11) of the Act, and we shall include them
in the unit.
We find that all production and maintenance employees of the
Employer at its plant in Columbia, South Carolina, excluding office
clerical and professional employees, guards, and supervisors as defined
in the Act, constitute a unit appropriate for the purposes of collective
bargaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act.
5. The Employer contends that no election should be held at this
time because, as a result of raw material shortages caused by the
international situation, it will have to reduce the number of employees
to two-thirds or one-half of the present number employed. Although
it appears that shortly before the hearing several employees had
already been discharged for this reason, we are.not persuaded that
the election should therefore be deferred. We have frequently held
that the mere reduction in the number of employees in a unit is not in
and of itself sufficient reason for postponing an election.3 In the pres-
ent instance it is clear that even if the Employer were to discharge
2 The remaining shop employees , some 8 to 10 in number, are in a "labor gang." Their
principal task is to load and unload railroad cars . The parties agree that the gang leader,
whose status with respect to the employees in his group is similar to that of the 3 persons
in dispute , is not a supervisor.
8 Knorr-Maynard , Inc., 90 NLRB No. 17, and cases there cited.
1336 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
as many as half of its employees for economic reasons, the remainder
would constitute a representative number of the employees in the unit.
We shall therefore direct an election in the unit hereinabove found
appropriate.
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this
volume.]