Yuba Manufacturing Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 16, 1947

74 N.L.R.B. 157 (N.L.R.B. 1947)

In the Matter of YuBA MANUFACTURING COMPANY, EMPLOYER and
INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF BOILERMAKERS , IRON SHIP BUILD-
ERS AND HELPERS OF AMERICA, LOCALS 39 AND 681, AFL, PETITIONER
Case No. 00-R-1865.Decided June 16,1947
Messrs. George H. Westerberg and E. Dean Elshire, of Benicia,
Calif., for the Employer.
Mr. Joseph Nobriga, of Oakland, Calif., for the Petitioner.
Mr. A. C. McGraw, of Oakland, Calif., and Mr. 0. E. McNally,
of San Rafael , Calif., for the Intervenor.
Mr. Emil C. Farkas, of counsel to the Board.
DECISION
AND
DIRECTION OF ELECTION
Upon a petition duly filed, hearing in this case was held at Vallejo,
California, on February 13, 1947, before Robert E. Tillman, hearing
officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from
prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed. At the hearing the In-
tervenor moved to dismiss the petition on the grounds that (a) its
contract with the Employer operates as a bar to a present election; (b)
the Petitioner's showing of interest is inadequate; and (c) the unit
sought is inappropriate. The hearing officer referred this motion to
the Board. For reasons hereinafter stated the motion is hereby
denied.
Upon the entire record in the case, the National Labor Relations
Board makes the following :
FINDINGS OF FACT
I. THE BUSINESS OF THE EMPLOYER
Yuba Manufacturing Company, a California corporation, is en-
gaged in the manufacture and sale of placer dredges, mining machin-
ery and carry alls at its plant at Benicia, California. During the
year 1946, the Employer purchased for use at its plant raw materials
valued at approximately $1,200,000, of which more than 20 percent
originated from points outside the State of California. During the
74 N. L. R. B., No. 34.
157
158 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD,
same period, the Employer manufactured finished products valued in
excess of $1,400,000, approximately 50 percent of which was sold and
shipped to customers outside the State.
The Employer admits and we find that it is engaged in commerce
within the meaning of the National Labor Relations Act.
II. THE ORGANIZATIONS INVOLVED
The Petitioner is a labor organization affiliated with the American
Federation of Labor, claiming to represent employees of the Em-
ployer.
International Association of Machinists, District 95 and Local
Lodge 1687, herein called the Intervenor, is a labor organization,
claiming to represent employees of the Employer.
III. THE QUESTION CONCERNING REPRESENTATION
On August 12, 1946, the Petitioner requested recognition as the
exclusive bargaining representative of certain employees of the Em-
ployer. The Employer declined recognition on the ground that it
was under contractual relationship with the Intervenor, whereupon
the Petitioner filed its petition herein on August 19, 1946.
The Employer and the Intervenor have been in contractual rela-
tionship since 1943. The most recent contract between these parties
was executed on March 1, 1946, and covered substantially all produc-
tion and maintenance employees including the employees sought
herein. It provided for an initial period ending June 1, 1.947, and
for its automatic renewal for annual periods thereafter in the ab-
sence of written notice to change given by either party to the other
at least 30 days prior to the expiration date of the contract.
As indicated above, the Intervenor urged as grounds for dismis-
sal that the petition was not timely filed and that the March 1, 1946,
contract is a bar. We find no merit in these grounds. Although the
contract is effective as a bar during its initial period, that period has
expired; and the contract is clearly no bar to a petition which ante-
dated its operative automatic renewal notice date.,'
The Intervenor also moved to dismiss the petition on the ground
that the Petitioner's showing of representation is not adequate. We
find no merit in this contention. The Board has frequently held that
the matter of showing of representation is purely an administrative
matter and is not subject to objection at the hearing.2 Moreover, we
1 Matter of Westinghouse Electric Corporation , 73 N. L. R. B 1282 ; Matter of Elder
Manufacturing Company, 73 N. L. R. B. 230; Matter of F. S Lang Manufacturing Com-
pany, 66 N. L. R. B. 473.
2 Matter of 0 D. Jennings & Company, 68 N. L. R. B . 516.
YUBA MANUFACTURING COMPANY 159
are administratively satisfied as to the adequacy of the Petitioner's
showing.
We therefore find that a question affecting commerce has arisen
concerning the representation of employees of the Employer, within
the meaning of Section 9 (c) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act.
IV. THE APPROPRIATE UNIT; THE DETERMINATION OF REPRESENTATIVES
The Petitioner seeks, in effect, a unit consisting of all employees in
the Employer's structural shop and welding shop, who are engaged
in working on steel plate or materials of a thickness of 10 gauge or
greater. This unit includes the following job classifications in the
structural shop : lay-out men, fitters, leadinguien bending roll opera-
tors, punch and shear operators, duplicators, and helpers; and em-
braces the following classifications in the welding shop : leading man,
welders, burners, burner operators, helpers and yardmen. The Em-
ployer and the Intervenor contend, however, that the only appro-
priate unit is the existing plant-wide unit of production and mainte-
nance employees presently represented by the Intervenor.
The Employer is engaged in the manufacture and sale of placer
dredges, mining machinery, and carry ails, a new product which it
began to manufacture after the war. The plant consists of a group
of six buildings designated as the main building, the forge shop,
the heat treating shop, the foundry, the pattern shop and the assembly
shop.' The main building is occupied by three shops, the machine
shop, the structural shop, and the welding shop, the latter functioning
as a subdivision of the structural shop. In the course of the Employ-
er's operations, raw materials are received at the plant and are un-
loaded either in the plant yard or at various shops where the proc-
essing or fabrication may begin. Actual manufacturing operations,
apparently, do not follow any routine pattern or procedure, although
the functions performed by the various shops are highly integrated
and are all geared to the production of the final product. Before
its completion, a given product may be handled a number of times by
the same shop. In the manufacture of a placer dredge, virtually all
shops perform some work on the product before it is finished and, in
several instances, each of the shops may perform work on each indi-
vidual piece going into the dredge.
In connection with the employees in the Employer's structural shop
_and welding shop, and with whom we are solely concerned herein, the
record discloses that all these employees are engaged in working on
steel plate or materials of a thickness of 10 gauge or greater and that,
8 The pattern shop and the foundry are operated independently of the plant management
on a contract basis.
755420-48-vol. 74-12
160 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
in almost every instance , they devote approximately 90 percent or
more of their time to such work. It indicates further that, for the
most part , all such employees are skilled , some to a greater degree
than others , and that all perform their duties either directly or
indirectly under the supervision of the structural shop foreman, and
function virtually as one department 4 Although they maintain a
close working relationship with employees in other departments, and
may, from time to time , perform their work in various parts of the
plant, it appears that their functions are not interchangeable with
those of other workers. With respect to helpers and yardmen, whom
the Petitioner desires to include in its proposed unit, the record shows
that these employees are assigned to the structural shop and welding
shop and that they regularly assist the various skilled employees in
the handling of materials in the process of fabrication . It, is there-
fore apparent that the requested employees comprise a cohesive and
well-defined group clearly distinguishable from the remaining em-
ployees, and that their establishment as a separate collective bargain-
ing unit is feasible.
The collective bargaining history affecting the Employer 's opera-
tions discloses the following : In February 1938, the Employer exe-
cuted a collective bargaining agreement with a Federal Labor Union,
affiliated with the American Federation of Labor , covering its em-
ployees for a term of 1 year. Successive contracts were thereafter
executed by the same parties in 1939, 1940 , and 1941. The Intervenor,
then an affiliate of the American Federation of Labor, became a joint
signatory to the 1941 contract , but did not sign the contract for 1942.
In 1942, the Employer converted its plant to the production of guns
and other ordnance equipment , as a result of which the structural
shop was taken over by a tube shop and the number of employees
at the entire plant increased from approximately 169 to a peak of
approximately 650. Most of these workers were engaged in working
with ordnance machines and fell within the jurisdiction of the Inter-
venor . In March 1943 at a conference called by the Federal Labor
Union, and at which various AFL craft unions in the area were pres-
ent, it was agreed that the Intervenor should be permitted to take
over the bargaining rights of the Federal Labor Union .5 Pursuant
to this agreement , the Federal Labor Union terminated its contract
with the Employer and dissolved its organization , and in May 1943
the Intervenor executed a new collective bargaining contract with
f The foreman of the molding shop is a subforeman of the structural shop foreman and
is responsible to him.
5 It would appear that the Petitioner was not among those present at that conference.
The crafts apparently acted upon the promise of the Intervenor to return non-machinists
to the jurisdiction of the respective crafts when ordnance operations terminated. The
Intervenor, however, denies this obligation and has no intention of yielding jurisdiction to
the craft unions.
YUB& MANUFACTURING COMPANY 161
the Employer covering all production and maintenance employees.
Similar contracts were entered into by the same parties in 1944 and
again in 1946.
The last-mentioned contract was executed after the Employer had
terminated its war production in September 1945 and had effected
the reconversion of its plant to peacetime operations. As a result
of this reconversion, the tube shop, established during the war, was
reconverted to its prewar role as a structural shop and the total
number of employees in the plant was reduced to its present number
of approximately 326. As noted previously, the Employer in addi-
tion thereupon undertook the manufacture of a new product known
as carry alls. This resulted in an expansion of employees in the
welding shop from a prewar level of 3 or 4 to the present number of
46, and brought the number of employees in the unit sought herein
to approximately 115 as of the time of the hearing, a virtual doubling
of its size when compared with the complement during the prewar
period.
With respect to this bargaining history, upon which the Intervenor
and the Employer rely in support of their unit position, we note the
following factors which tend to minimize its significance in the in-
stant case: (1) for the first 4 years of this period, the Employer
bargained collectively with the Federal Labor Union, the reposi-
tory of all craft interests at the plant, until such time as any craft
desired to step in and assert a claim on employees under its juris-
diction; (2) from 1942 until 1945 the Employer was engaged in the
manufacture of guns and other war products which required different
operations and skills than under its peacetime operations, and the
unit which the Intervenor represented, therefore, was not the same
unit for which the Federal Labor Union had been the bargaining
agent; (3) the existing plant operation and more particularly the
unit sought is virtually double the size it was during the prewar
years; and (4) the bargaining history between the Employer and
the Intervenor, since the reconversion of the plant in 1945, is of rela-
tively short duration. We note further that this bargaining is not
predicated on any prior Board determination. We are of the opinion,
therefore, that the bargaining history is not sufficient, in and of itself,
to deny the employees in the structural shop and the welding shop the
opportunity of deciding whether they desire either to continue to be
represented as a part of the existing production and maintenance unit
or to bargain as a separate unit. And this is particularly true in
view of the added fact that these employees have not had a previous
opportunity to vote on this issue, an opportunity which we believe
they should now be given.
162 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD,
Accordingly, we shall direct that an election by secret ballot be
held among all employees of the Employer in the structural shop and
the welding shop who are engaged in working on steel plate or mate-
rials of the thickness of 10 gauge or greater, excluding crane operators,
and all supervisory employees with authority to hire, promote, dis-
charge, discipline, or, otherwise effect changes in the status of em-
ployees, or effectively recommend such action, subject to the limita-
tions and additions set forth in the Direction.
At this time we shall make no final determination of the appro-
priate unit. Such determination will depend, in part, upon the re-
sults of the election. If the employees in the above voting group
select the Petitioner, they will be taken to have indicated their desire
to constitute a separate bargaining unit; if they select the Intervenor,
they will be taken to have indicated their desire to remain a part of
the existing production and maintenance unit.
DIRECTION OF ELECTION 6
As part of the investigation to ascertain representatives for the pur-
poses of collective bargaining with Yuba Manufacturing Company,
Benicia, California, an election by secret ballot shall be conducted as
early as possible, but not later than thirty (30) days from the date of
this Direction, under the direction and supervision of the Regional
Director for the Twentieth Region, acting in this matter as agent for
the National Labor Relations Board, and subject to Sections 203.55
and 203.56, of National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations-
Series 4, among the employees in the voting group found appropriate
in Section IV, above, who were employed during the pay-roll period
immediately preceding the date of this Direction, including employees
who did not work during said pay-roll period because they were ill
or on vacation or temporarily laid off, and including employees in the
armed forces of the United States who present themselves in person
at the polls, but excluding those employees who have since quit or
been discharged for cause and have not been rehired or reinstated
prior to the date of the election, to determine whether they desire to
be represented by International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Iron
Ship Builders and Helpers of America, Locals 39 and 681, AFL, or by
International Association of Machinists, District 95 and Local Lodge
1687 (unaffiliated), for the purposes of collective bargaining, or by
neither.
MR. JAMES J. REYNOLDS, JR., took no part in the consideration of the
above, Decision and' Direction of Election.
6 Any participant in the election herein may , upon its prompt request to , and approval
thereof by, the Regional Director , have its name removed from the ballot.