Westinghouse Electric Corp.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Oct 25, 1954

110 N.L.R.B. 475 (N.L.R.B. 1954)

WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION 475
time employees as that term is used by the Board. We shall therefore
amend our Decision and Direction of Election to exclude them from
the unit,
Order
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the Decision and Direction of Election
herein be amended by striking footnote 1, and by amending the de-
scription of the appropriate unit to read as follows :
All grocery employees employed at the Employer's retail stores
in Montgomery County, Ohio, including part-time clerks who
have worked during at least 18 separate weeks preceding the De-
cision and Direction of Election, but excluding part-time clerks
who have worked for the Employer less than 18 weeks, meat de-
partment employees, guards, professional employees, store man-
agers, assistant store managers, perishable food managers, and all
other supervisors as defined in the Act.
MEMBERS RODGERS and BEESON took no part in the consideration of
the above Order Amending Decision and Direction of Election.
WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION 1 and INTERNATIONAL UNION
OF ELECTRICAL , RADIO AND MACHINE WORKERS, CIO, PETITIONER.2
Cases Nos. 4-RC-2391 and 4-RC-2449. October 25,19544
Decision and Direction of Election
Upon consolidated petitions duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the
National Labor Relations Act,' a hearing was held before Eugene
M. Levine, hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the
hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed .4
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the Act.
1 The name of the Employer appears as amended at the hearing.
3 Herein referred to as I. U E
3 At the hearing, over the Employer 's objection, the hearing officer correctly permitted
the I U E to amend its unit request
Section 4 (b) of the petition ( 4-RC-2391 ) was amended at the hearing to read "lamps"
in lieu of "electronics "
4 Prior to , and throughout the hearing , it appeared that the parties might agree to a
consent election , but due to the fact that they were unable to resolve their differences as
to the appropriate unit and the time for holding such an election, no agreement was forth-
coming Based upon an alleged attempt by the Petitioner to stall a consent election by
shifting its unit request at the hearing ( as noted hereinafter ), and refusing to agree to
an election date, the Intervenor moved to dismiss the proceeding on the ground that the
Petitioner filed its petition in bad faith , and, thus, abused the Board 's processes How-
ever , as the record shows that the negotiations for a consent election failed, at least in
part , because of the inability of the parties to agree on the composition of the unit, we are
not satisfied that the Petitioner has shown bad faith . Accordingly , the Intervenor's mo-
tion is hereby denied.
110 NLRB No. 72.
476 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent certain
employees of the Employer .5
3. The U. E. urges its 1950 contract, as amended by a 1953 supple-
ment containing a June 30, 1954, termination date, as a bar to this
proceeding. It contends that, since neither party gave notice to termi-
nate pursuant to the 60-day automatic renewal clause, the contract was
automatically renewed. The record discloses, however, that the Peti-
tioner notified the Employer of its claim on April 30, 1954, and
filed its petition with the Board on May 7, 1954. Accordingly, as the
claim herein was made prior to the Mill-B date, and the petition was
thereafter timely filed, we find that the contract is not a bar to a
present determination of representatives.6
We therefore find that a question affecting commerce exists concern-
ing the representation of employees of the Employer within the mean-
ing of Section 9 (c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act.
4. Since 1940, the production, maintenance, and warehouse em-
ployees employed at the Employer's Trenton, New Jersey, plant and
warehouse, including group leaders, the lead wire clerks, and the coil
clerk, have been represented and bargained for in a production and
maintenance unit by the intervening U. E.7 The Petitioner herein
seeks, pursuant to its amended unit request, to represent, with the usual
exclusions, these same employees, plus office and clerical employees of
the Employer "at its Trenton, New Jersey, plants." This request was
interpreted by the Petitioner to mean "all factory employees and ware-
house employees who are now in the bargaining unit, and, in addition,
all white collared employees in both the warehouse and the main plant
on Pennington Avenue, and the same unit in any future plants that
may be erected by the Company or operated by the Company within
Trenton, New Jersey." The U. E. and the Employer contend that
only the production and maintenance contractual unit is appropriate.
The I. U. E. stated that, as an alternate, it would accept this unit .8
In view of the fact that the Board has consistently held that office
clerical employees should not properly be included in a production
and maintenance unit,' and as we find nothing in this case that war-
5 Local 443, United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America, herein referred
to as U E., was peimitted intervention based upon its contractual ielations with the
Employer
9 See Little Rock Furniture Maiv.ufacturvnq Company, 80 NLRB 65
4 The record discloses that plant clerical employees have been included in this unit,
although not specifically referred to as such, and that this unit was found appropriate and
subsequently certified by the Board in 1950 See Westinghouse Electric Corporation, 89
NLRB 8 at 26
8 As noted hereinafter , we are not directing an election in the amended unit We there-
fore deem it unnecessary to pass upon the Employer 's motion to dismiss the petition based
upon the "unrealistic " nature of the Petitioner 's amendment.
9 Western Electric Company, Ine, 85 NLRB 227.
THE HITCHCOCK CORPORATION 477
rants a departure from this rule, we shall, accordingly, exclude office
clerical employees from the unit.
In connection with the Petitioner's request that employees in any
future plants erected by the Employer in the Trenton area be in-
cluded in the unit, we note that no evidence was adduced at the hear-
ing with respect to any prospective company expansion. However,
even if the Employer was anticipating new locations in the Trenton
area, we are of the opinion that the propriety of including in the unit
employees of any such plants should be decided in future proceedings
for clarification of the certification or redetermination of the appro-
priate unit.10 We shall, therefore, confine the unit here found ap-
propriate to the Employer's present Trenton, New Jersey, plant.
We find that all production, maintenance, and warehouse employees
of the Employer at its Trenton works, 400 Pennington Avenue, Tren-
ton, New Jersey, including group leaders, the lead wire clerks, and the
coil clerk, but excluding all office clerical employees, technical em-
ployees, guards, professional employees, and supervisors as defined
in the Act, constitute a unit appropriate for the purposes of collec-
tive bargaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act.
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication.]
io See The Conner Lumber and Land Oompanj, 90 NLRB 283.
THE HITCHCOCK CORPORATION and INTERNATIONAL CHEMICAL WORK-
ERS UNION OF AMERICA, A. F. of L., PETITIONER. Case No. 11-RC-
605. October 25, 195.E
Supplemental Decision and Certification of Representatives
Pursuant to a Decision and Direction of Election issued by the
Board on July 6, 1954,1 an election by secret ballot was conducted on
July 23, 1954, under the supervision of the Regional Director for the
Eleventh Region among the employees in the appropriate unit at the
Employer's operations in Murphy, North Carolina. Upon the con-
clusion of the election, the parties were furnished with a tally of bal-
lots, which showed that, of approximately 40 eligible voters, 26 voted
for, and 7 against, the Petitioner and 23 ballots were challenged. The
number of challenged ballots was sufficient to affect the results of the
election.
The Employer filed timely objections to conduct of the Petitioner
allegedly affecting the results of the election. In accordance with the
i Not reported in printed volumes of Board Decisions and Orders.
110 NLRB No. 85.