Vista Del Mar Child Care Service

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 10, 1971

191 N.L.R.B. 32 (N.L.R.B. 1971)

32 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Jewish Orphan 's Home of Southern California a/k/a
Vista Del Mar Child Care Service and American
Federation of State , County, and Municipal Em-
ployees, AFL-CIO, Petitioner . Case 21-RC-12105
June 10, 1971
DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION
BY MEMBERS FANNING, JENKINS, AND KENNEDY
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of the
National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a hearing
was held before Hearing Officer Orville S. Johnson.
After the hearing and pursuant to the National Labor
Relations Board Rules and Regulations, Series 8, as
amended, the Regional Director for Region 21 issued
an Order transferring the case to the Board for deci-
sion. Thereafter, the Employer and the Union 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, the Board finds:
1. The Employer is a nonprofit California corpora-
tion. The Employer is engaged in the treatment of emo-
tionally disturbed children between the ages of 6 and
18. Each child in the home must have at least one
Jewish parent. In addition, the Employer provides an
adoption service for unwed mothers and has a foster
parents home program. At the time of the hearing the
Employer had a total of 106 children receiving residen-
tial care, and approximately 11 children in foster
homes. Its basic services encompass residential treat-
ment, a foster home program, an aftercare program for
children who were formerly residents, adoption ser-
vices, and counseling services for unwed parents.
Children receiving residential treatment live in eight
cottages. Seven of these are located at its main facility
on Motor Avenue in Los Angeles, California; one cot-
tage is located at the facility on Weddington Street in
North Hollywood, California. The Employer operates
two schools on the grounds at Motor Avenue. It also
maintains an infirmary and has a medical staff com-
posed of a pediatrician, a dentist, and three psychia-
trists. As part of its services, it administers a religious
program. As an aid to its general fundraising efforts,
the Employer operates a thrift shop, located approxi-
mately 5 miles from the Motor Avenue facility, where
it sells used clothing and furniture it receives as dona-
tions.
For the fiscal year ending February 28, 1971, the
Employer's gross income from all services was approxi-
mately $1,240,000. It recieved (1) $350,000 from the
county of Los Angeles for care of county placed chil-
dren; (2) $230,000 from contributions through the
`United Way fund; (3) $250,000 through its own chari-
table fundraising efforts; (4) $100,000 from charitable
contributions from various groups; (5) $130,000 from
private individuals for child tare; (6) $80,000 from re-
tail sales of the thrift store; and (7) $100,000 from
income on investments. The exact source of the invest-
ment income is not set forth in the record. However;
the Employer's business manager testified that the Em-
ployer's investment portfolio consists of government
bonds and "triple-A" securities traded on the ex-
changes. The Employer receives approximately $400 to
$500 per month from a New York agency for the care
of a child in a foster home whose foster parents moved
from New York to California bringing the child with
them.
The Employer's total expenditure for goods and ser-
vices was $210,000. Of that sum, payments of $110,000
were made to the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, office of
Sawyer School Division of Automatic Retailers of
America for food services provided by their local office
and west coast division. Another $500 was for other
miscellaneous items, purchased from outside Cali-
fornia.
The evidence in therecord establishes that the Em-
ployer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
Section 2(6) and (7) of the National Labor Relations
Act. It further establishes that the revenues and ex-
penditures of the Employer are sufficient in amount to
meet any of our ordinary jurisdictional standards.' Ac-
cordingly, we find that the Employer exerts a substan-
tial impact on commerce and that-it would effectuate
the policies of the Act to assert jurisdicition herein.
2. The labor organization involved claims to repre-
sent certain employees of the Employer.
3. A question affecting commerce exists concerning
the representation of employees of the Employer within
the meaning of Section 9(c)(1) and Section 2(6) and (7)
of the Act.
4. Petitioner here 'seeks an overall bargaining unit
composed of all the Employer's nonsupervisory em-
ployees, with social workers and teachers, as profes-
sional employees, having the right to a self-determina-
tion election under Section 9(b)(1). The Employer
contends that social workers, houseparents, counselors,
teachers, and religious school teachers, because of the
functional difference between the work of this group
' In the absence of any specific standards for this type of operation, we
have applied existing standards, but we leave open the question of whether
or not to establish a specific standard for such cases. See The Children's
Village, Inc., 186 NLRB No 137.
191 NLRB No. 11
VISTA DEL MAR CHILD CARE SERVICE
and the work performed by the Employer's other em-
ployees, cannot properly be included in a unit with
employees who are not directly involved in the Em-
ployer's child care functions. The Employer agrees
with Petitioner that social workers and teachers, as
professional employees, have the right to a self-deter-
mination election.
The Employer has the following employees with the
following functions: (1) 11 social workers who are re-
sponsible for the children in the foster homes and rela-
tions with the child, parents, and foster parents in car-
rying out the prescribed programs; (2) 4 teachers who
teach at the Employer's schools; (3) 28 houseparents
who supervise the children in the cottages; (4) 10
counselors who work closely with the social workers
and houseparents in the area of recreational programs;
(5) 4 infirmary employees including a licensed voca-
tional nurse and three nurse 's assistants who perform
various nursing functions; (6) several part-time teach-
ers to teach the children religion; (7) 12 clerical em-
ployees who perform normal office functions; (8) 12
maintenance employees to maintain the grounds; (9) 3
employees who staff the thrift shop.
All employees are presently covered by one of two
personnel codes. All live-in employees and all counse-
lors, including two live-in maintenance employees and
a live-in gardener, are covered by a code entitled, "Per-
sonnel Practices Code for Child-Care, Live-in and Pro-
gram Staff." The remaining employees, including child
care, maintenance, and clerical employees, are covered
by a code entitled, "Personnel Code for the agencies of
the Jewish C. Federation Council of Greater Los An-
geles." Each of these is an extensive document covering
the hours, wages, and other terms and conditions of
employment.
In our opinion the unit sought by the Petitioner is
appropriate. The employees in the overall unit have a
community of interest. This community of interest is
demonstrated by the many similarities in the terms and
conditions of their employment as set forth in the two
personnel codes. The difference in their functions as to
the care of the children who are treated by the Em-
ployer do not sufficiently detract from this community
of interest to warrant our finding that the unit sought
by the Petitioner is inappropriate. Accordingly, we
shall direct separate elections in the following voting
groups:
(a) All employees, including nurses, houseparents,
counselors, clerical, and maintenance employees,
employed at the Employer's 3200 Motor Avenue,
Los Angeles, California, and 11909 Weddington
Street, North Hollywood, California, facilities and
Thrift Store employees at the 8566 West Pico, Los
Angeles, California, store, excluding all other em-
ployees, professional employees, guards, and
supervisors, as defined in the Act.
33
(b) All social workers and teachers employed at
the Employer's 3200 Motor Avenue, Los Angeles,
California,- and 11909 Weddington Street, North
Hollywood, California, facilities, excluding all
nonprofessional employees, guards, and super-
visors, as defined in the Act.
The employees in the professional voting group, (b),
will be asked two questions on their ballots:
(1) Do you desire to be included in the same unit as
other employees of Vista Del Mar for the purposes of
collective bargaining?
(2) Do you desire to be represented for the purposes
of collective bargaining by the American Federation of
State, County and Municipal Employees, AFL-CIO?
If a majority of the employees iii voting group (b)
vote "Yes" to the first question, indicating they wish to
be included in a unit with the nonprofessional em-
ployees, they will be so included. Their votes on the
second question will then be counted together with the
votes of the nonprofessional voting group, (a), to decide
the representative for the whole unit. If, on the other
hand, a majority of the professional employees in vot-
ing group (b) do not vote for the inclusion, they will not
be included with the nonprofessional employees, and
their votes on the second question will then be sepa-
rately counted to decide whether they want to be repre-
sented in a separate professional unit. ,
We make the following findings in regard to the
appropriate unit:
(1) If a majority of the professional employees vote
for inclusion in a unit with nonprofessional employees,
we find that the following employees will constitute a
unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bargain-
ing within the meaning of Section 9(b) of the Act:
All employees, including social workers, teachers,
nurses, houseparents, counselors, clerical, and
maintenance employees employed at the Em-
ployer's 3200 Motor Avenue, Los Angeles, Cali-
fornia, and 11909 Weddington Street, North Hol-
lywood, California , facilities , and Thrift Store
employees at the 8566 West Pico, Los Angeles,
California, store, excluding all other employees,
guards, and supervisors, as defined in the Act.
(2) If a majority of the professional employees do not
vote for inclusion in the unit with nonprofessional em-
ployees, we find that the following two groups of em-
ployees will constitute separate units appropriate for
collective bargaining within the meaning of 9(b) of the
Act:
(a) All employees, including nurses, houseparents,
counselors, clerical, and maintenance employees,
employed at the Employer's 3200 Motor Avenue,
Los Angeles, California, and 11909 Weddington
Street, North Hollywood, California, facilities and
Thrift Store employees at the 8566 West Pico, Los
Angeles, California, store, excluding all other em-
34 'DECISIONS`.GFNATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
ployees, professional employees, guards, and
supervisors, jas,defined,in`the Act.
(b) All social.woi,,kers'=andtteaehers,employed at
the Employer's 3200 Motor Avenue,.L;os Angeles,
California, and 11909 Weddington Street, North
' 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 shall have access to lists of voters and their addresses
which may be used to communicate with them. Excelsior Underwear Inc.,
156 NLRB 1236; N.L.R B. v Wyman-Gordon Co., 394 U.S. 759. Accord-
ingly, it is hereby directed that election eligibility lists, containing the names
`Hollywood, California, facilities, excluding all
nonprofessional employees, guards, and super-
visors, as defined in the Act.
[Direction of Tlections2 omitted from publication.]
and addresses of all eligible voters, must be filed by the Employer with the
Regional Director for Region 21 within 7 days of the date of this Decision
and Direction of Elections. The Regional Director shall make the lists
available to all parties to the elections. No extensions of time to file these
lists shall be granted by the Regional Director except in extraordinary
circumstances. Failure to comply with this requirement shall be grounds for
setting aside the elections whenever proper objections are filed.