Vowell Construction Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Feb 28, 1957

117 N.L.R.B. 490 (N.L.R.B. 1957)

490 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
the Anaconda Company, and thus its operations satisfy the Board's
indirect outflow standards ; secondly, the Employer constitutes a single
Employer with the Anaconda Company whose gigantic operations
obviously meet several of the Board's jurisdictional standards 25
' Anaconda Company, 114 NLRB 530; Anaconda Copper Mming Company, 104 NLRB
1064 (corporate name changed between dates of the two cases). Anaconda Company's
Consolidated Income Report for 1955, discloses gross sales and revenues of $630,703,000.
Standard and Poor's Corporation Records, A-B, page 2102
Vowell Construction Company and International Hod Carriers
Building and Common Laborers' Union, Local No. 417, AFL-
CIO, and Truck Drivers, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen & Helpers
Local Union No. 941, AFL-CIO, Joint-Petitioners . Case No.
33-RC-585. February 28, X957
DECISION AND ORDER
Upon a petition duly filed, under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor
Relations Act, a hearing was held before Byron E. Guse, hearing
officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free
from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Vowell Construction Company, hereinafter referred to as
Vowell, is engaged in the construction of roads, highways, and streets
in the State of Texas. During the last calendar year it performed no
services outside the State of Texas. Its direct out-of-State purchases
amounted to approximately $40,000. During the same period it per-
formed services valued in excess of $250,000, for businesses engaged in
interstate commerce. These services consisted of the construction and
blacktopping of parking facilities. During the same period Vowell
furnished services and materials valued in excess of $100,000, pursuant
to a contract with the United States Government for the construction
of runways and landing strips at Biggs Air Force Base in El Paso,
Texas. The employees involved herein are engaged in furnishing
maintenance services on roads and grounds of the Standard Oil Com-
pany of Texas under a contract between that company and Vowell.
Vowell contends that the Board should not assert jurisdiction herein
because the services it performs for businesses engaged in interstate
commerce do not enter the stream of commerce, and because the em-
ployees involved were not engaged in the performance of services
under the contract with the United States Government. We find no
merit in these contentions. The Board's indirect outflow standard
does not require that the goods or services furnished to businesses en-
117 NLRB No. 69.
VOWELL CONSTRUCTION COMPANY 491
gaged in interstate commerce must enter the stream of commerce.;
Furthermore, in the application of its jurisdictional standards, the
Board does not require that the particular employees involved in a
proceeding must, themselves, be engaged in operations affecting com-
merce within the purview of the Board's jurisdictional standards 2
It is sufficient that Vowell's operations considered in their totality,
satisfy the Board's jurisdictional standards. Accordingly, as Vowell's
operations, so considered, satisfy the Board's jurisdictional standards,
we find that it will effectuate the policies of the Act to assert jurisdic-
tion herein.'
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent certain em-
ployees of Vowell.
- 3. Subsequent to the hearing the Joint-Petitioners and Vowell filed
separate motions requesting the Board to dismiss the petition. The
Joint-Petitioners allege that the contract between Vowell and Standard
Oil Company of Texas, which was not available to it at the time of the
hearing, shows conclusively that the employees involved herein, were
at all times employees of Standard Oil rather than of Vowell. Fur-
thermore, it alleges, that since the hearing that contract has ter-
minated, and Standard Oil has entered into a similar agreement, cover-
ing the operations of the employees involved, with a firm other than
Vowell. In its motion, Vowell alleges that due to the termination of
its contract with Standard and the subsequent execution of a similar
contract between Standard Oil and another firm the employees in-
volved, are no longer in its employ.
As the parties are in agreement that the employees involved herein,
are no longer employed by Vowell,4 it is apparent that no question con-
cerning representation of employees employed by Vowell is raised by
the petition. Accordingly as requested by the parties in their separate
motions,5 we shall dismiss the petition. We do so without prejudice to
the filing of a new petition, in the event circumstances so alter as to
make such action appropriate s -
[The Board dismissed the petition.]
l Whippany Motor Co., Inc ., 115 NLRB 52 ; Jonesboro Grain Drying Cooperative, 110
NLRB 481.
2 The Plumbing Contractors Association of Baltimore , Maryland, Inc., 93 NLRB 1081,
1083, footnote 9.
a Whvppany Motor Co ., Inc., supra ; Maytag Aircraft Corp, 110 NLRB 594.
4 We find it unnecessary to determine , whether the employees involved were at any
time employees of Vowell
5 The Joint-Petitioners ' motion requested the Board to consolidate the instant proceed-
ing with a complaint case concerning unfair labor practice charges against Standard on
Company of Texas , and involving the same employees involved herein , or in the alternative
to dismiss the petition . As noted above the Joint -Petitioners' basic position is that Vowell
Construction Company is not the Employer of the employees involved. Accordingly, it
would serve no useful purpose to consolidate the two cases . We therefore deny the Joint-
Petitioners ' request for a hearing on this part of its motion.
a Cf. H. W. Rickel and Company, l5roedtert Grain & Malting Company, Inc ., 105 NLRB
679, 680.