Rostone Corp.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Apr 20, 1972

196 N.L.R.B. 467 (N.L.R.B. 1972)

ROSTONE CORPORATION
Rostone Corporation and International Brotherhood of
Electrical Workers, AFL-CIO, Petitioner. Case 25-
RC-4654
April 20, 1972
DECISION ON REVIEW
BY CHAIRMAN MILLER AND MEMBERS FANNING AND
JENKINS
On August 18, 1971, the Regional Director for
Region 25 issued a Decision and Direction of Election
in the above-entitled proceeding in which, inter alia,
he directed a self-determination election among the
petitioned-for hot mold production and maintenance
employees of the Employer in Lafayette, Indiana,
finding that they constituted an appropriate voting
group of residual unrepresented employees and re-
jecting the contentions of the Employer and Interve-
nor United Brick and Clay Workers of America,
AFL-CIO, that the only appropriate unit for the re-
quested employees must encompass all production
and maintenance employees engaged in -both hot
mold and cold mold operations at the facilities in-
volved.' Thereafter, the Employer, in accordance with
the National Labor Relations Board Rules and Reg-
ulations, filed a timely Request for Review of the
Regional Director's decision on the grounds that he
made findings of fact which are clearly erroneous and
depart from officially reported precedent. The Peti-
tioner filed opposition thereto.
By telegraphic order dated September 9, 1971, the
National Labor Relations Board granted the Request
for Review and stayed the election pending decision
on review. All the parties filed briefs on review.
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 au-
thority in this proceeding to a three-member panel.
The Board has considered the entire record with
respect to the issues under review, including the briefs
on review, and hereby affirms the Regional Director's
Decision and Direction of Election.
In footnote 4 of his Decision, the Regional Director
stated as follows:
The IBEW seeks a unit essentially limited to
the hot mold employees while the Brick and Clay
Workers and the Employer contend that only an
essentially plantwide unit consisting of employ-
ees in both hot and cold mold operations is ap-
1 The Intervenor filed a petition in Case 25-UC-38 seeking to clarify its
certified unit of cold mold process employees by adding thereto the hot mold
process employees here sought by the Petitioner . The case was consolidated
with the instant proceeding for purposes of hearing and decision . The Re-
gional Director denied the clarification request and no request for review was
filed with respect to his decision in that regard.
467
propriate. At a simplified level, the difference
between the two processes is that in the hot mold
process the product is formed and cured in the
same operation, while separate curing steps after
formation by presses is necessary in cold mold
production. While at least some of the
Employer's products may be produced by either
process, the skills required in each process are
sufficiently different to require a six months
training period for employees who transfer. The
two production processes and the die shop for
each are located in separate ends of the same
building, are separated by offices, storage, and
receiving areas, and are joined essentially by two
aisles . Personnel, scheduling higher level supervi-
sion, and maintenance services are plantwide
while supervision at the lower levels is separate
for each operation. Wages, hours, and working
conditions are generally the same for both de-
partments. While the record reveals some instan-
ces of permanent transfer from cold mold to hot
mold, there is no evidence of significant employ-
ee or supervisory interchange between depart-
ments other than instances of unspecified
frequency where employees from hot mold oper-
ations may use equipment located only in the
cold mold end of the plant.
Clearly the essentially plantwide unit urged by
the Employer and Brick and Clay Workers may
be found to be an appropriate unit. Equally
clearly, the unit sought by the IBEW is com-
prised of a clearly defined group of employees
who constitute the only unrepresented produc-
tion and maintenance employees in the plant
who may also be found to be an appropriate unit
for collective bargaining. Remington Rand Divi-
sion of Sperry Rand Corp., 120 NLRB 1294; Mar-
ion Mfg. Co., 101 NLRB 256; Houston Lighting &
Power Co., 100 NLRB 76. The cases relied on by
the Employer and the Brick and Clay Workers in
support of a contrary conclusion are clearly dis-
tinguishable. In the instant case the history of
collective bargaining reflects that by their bar-
gaining practices the Employer and the Brick and
Clay Workers created two units of employees:
the cold mold employees and a second or resi-
dual unit primarily comprising hot mold employ-
ees, whom the Employer and the Brick and Clay
Workers by their conduct agreed should not have
the same representation as the cold mold em-
ployees. In such circumstances, a residual unit is
appropriate (see cases cited, supra). Since there
never existed a recognized unit in which the hot
mold employees were included, cases involving
severance of units are inapposite. Similarly, the
argument that the two separate units of employ-
196 NLRB No. 66
468 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
ees the parties themselves have established and
lived with over the years creates an impractical
dichotomy is not convincing.
Accordingly, since either unit can be appropri-
ate, no unit determination will be made at this
time. Rather the employees in the voting group
set forth above will be allowed to express their
desires to be represented in a separate unit, to be
included in the existing unit, or to remain unre-
presented.
We are satisfied, upon review of the record, that the
unit of cold mold process employees for which the
Employer and the Intervenor have bargained subse-
quent to the relocation of the hot mold process opera-
tions in a new wing of the same physical plant
continues as a viable unit. For this reason, we find
that production and maintenance employees current-
ly unrepresented at the Employer's Lafayette, Indi-
ana, facilities may, if they so desire, constitute an
appropriate residual unit .2
An election is therefore directed in the following
voting group:
All production and maintenance employees in
the hot mold department of the Employer's fa-
cilities located on U.S. Highway 52 South and
Earl Avenue in Lafayette, Indiana, excluding
production and maintenance employees repre-
sented by the Intervenor, all managerial employ-
ees, guards, office clerical employees, and
supervisors as defined in the Act.
Accordingly, we shall remand the case to the Re-
gional Director for the purpose of conducting an elec-
tion pursuant to his Decision and Direction of
Election, except the payroll period for determining
eligibility shall be that immediately preceding the date
of issuance.3
2 Our dissenting colleague concludes that the original separately located
groups of hot mold and cold mold employees have lost their identity by
removal to the same plant location despite continued separate function and
supervision, and lack of significant interchange . In addition our colleague
assigns no importance to the fact that the hot mold group here sought is
previously unrepresented , thus residual , and that its lack of representation
was no historical accident . The hot mold group is not a fringe group but a
distinct processing group in which the Board directed an election in 1965,
which the Intervenor lost. Subsequently Intervenor made no effort to repre-
sent them along with the cold mold group . In the circumstances the hot mold
employees are entitled to vote whether they wish to be represented separately
by the representative which now seeks them or by the existing representative
of the cold mold employees which now urges an overall unit . The cases cited
in the dissent are not pertinent to the problem of residual units of previously
unrepresented employees. We would also point out that it has been Board
practice to give an unrepresented residual group self-determination unless
there is a question concerning representation in the historic bargaining unit
to which a fringe group sought by no other union is to be added . See D. V.
Displays Corp., 134 NLRB 568, 571.
In order to assure that all eligible voters may have the opportunity to be
informed of the issues in the exercise of their statutory right to vote, all parties
to the election should have access to a list of voters and their addresses which
may be used to communicate with them . Excelsior Underwear Inc., 156
NLRB 1?36; N.LR.B v. Wyman-Gordon Co., 394 U.S. 759. Accordingly, it
is hereby directed that a corrected election eligibility list, containing the
names and addresses of all the eligible voters , must be filed by the Employer
CHAIRMAN MILLER, dissenting:
Neither present conditions nor the bargaining his-
tory, in my view, support my colleagues' conclusion
that the hot mold employees constitute a distinct
group of employees with such separate interests that
they may be excluded from the production unit
sought by the Intervenor.
The Employer is engaged in the manufacture of
electrical insulators. At the Lafayette operations here
involved it makes a large variety of such products
using cold mold and hot mold processes .4 In 1965, its
Lafayette operations comprised a plant located on
U.S. Highway 52 Bypass, South, hereinafter referred
to as the main plant, where products were manufac-
tured by the cold mold process, and a plant on Earl
Avenue which utilized the newer hot mold process.
During 1965, upon petitions filed by the Intervenor,
consent elections were held in separate units of pro-
duction and maintenance employees at each of these
plants. The Intervenor, although unsuccessful in the
Earl Avenue unit, was certified as the representative
of the employees in the cold mold process unit and
negotiated a 3-year contract with the Employer there-
for. In 1966, the Employer transferred virtually all of
the Earl Avenue operations to a new addition to the
main plants Although the Intervenor heretofore
made no effort to add the hot mold process employees
to its existing contract unit, the Employer has extend-
ed the benefits of the Intervenor's contracts to all
unrepresented Lafayette employees.
Since 1966, hot mold and cold mold production
operations have been carried on in the same physical
plant within separate departments divided only by
aisles . Although each department is separately super-
vised, all plant production and maintenance opera-
tions are under a vice president of manufacture.
Production scheduling, payroll, and other administra-
tive functions are performed on a plantwide basis.
Notably, all policies and practices with regard to la-
bor grades, wage rates, incentives, merit evaluations,
with the Regional Director for Region 25 within 7 days of the date of this
Decision on Review . The Regional Director shall make the list available to
all parties to the election. No extension of time to file this list shall be granted
by the Regional Director except in extraordinary circumstances . Failure to
comply with this requirement shall be grounds for setting aside the election
whenever proper objections are filed.
4 The hot mold process is newer and has gradually replaced the cold mold
process as the preferred method in the manufacture of many of the
Employer's products . The Employer also has a plant at Spencer , Indiana,
where use of the cold mold process has been phased out and at present all
manufacture is done by the hot mold process . During the transition from the
combination cold and hot mold process to a hot mold process plant, the
employees at Spencer have been represented on a plantwide basis . Through
a wholly owned subsidiary , the Employer also operates a plant in Ontario
Province, Canada, where both processes are used, and employees are repre-
sented on a plantwide basis.
' Certain spray-up operations ancillary to the hot mold process continue
to be performed at the Earl Avenue plant However, the Employer is attempt-
ing to sell the plant and the parties agreed that the small number of unrepre-
sented employees now working there should be treated as part of the hot
mold process group for purposes of this case.
ROSTONE CORPORATION 469
fringe benefits, plant rules and regulations, safety, and
industrial relations are the same for both production
departments. Indeed, even seniority is maintained on
a plantwide basis despite transfer from one depart-
ment to the other.
At the time of the hearing, there were about 85
employees involved in cold mold operations and 140
in hot mold. Since the Intervenor's certification in
1965, the number of employees in hot mold has in-
creased substantially and the number in cold mold
has decreased. This shift to the hot mold type of pro-
duction is expected to continue at Lafayette. Produc-
tion employees in each department are classified as
mixers, press operators, and finishers. Employees in
each of these classifications are in the same labor
grade in terms of skills, regardless of the department
in which they work.
Each production department has a separate die
shop, although certain dies are basically identical for
both processes, and certain equipment and tools are
available only in one of the die shops. Finishing and
inspection is generally done by separate groups under
separate immediate supervision. However, interme-
diate supervision is common for both groups perform-
ing these two functions. Employees engaged in other
support functions, such as mechanical maintenance
(8), plant and facilities maintenance (5), tool crib (2),
shipping and receiving (10), and laboratory, serve
both production departments.
These facts establish, I conclude, that the relocation
and consolidation of the Earl Avenue operations at
the main plant in 1966 so merged the interests of the
hot mold and cold mold production and maintenance
employees that the complements previously agreed to
be separate appropriate units lost their identity as
such.6 In these circumstances, and because the bar-
gaining history subsequent to the consolidation estab-
lishes that the substantive terms of the Intervenor's
contracts have in fact been extended to hot mold
employees, I would find that they do not enjoy a
community of interest sufficiently distinct from cold
mold employees to constitute an appropriate voting
group and that only a plantwide unit is,appropriate
herein .7
6 See Cutler-Hammer, Inc., 161 NLRB 1627; and Westinghouse Electric
Corporation, 144 NLRB 455, 458. See also Dexdale Hosiery Mills, 115 NLRB
228, 230; and The Mennen Company, 108 NLRB 355.
7 See Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Company, 129 NLRB 789; Ow-
ens-Illinois Glass Company, 112 NLRB 172; and The Mennen Company, supra.