Industrial Rayon Corp.

In.the Matter Of. INDUSTRIAL RAYON CORPORATION, COVINGTON, VIR- GINIA, PLANT, EMPLOYER and INTERNATIONAL UNION OF.OPERATING . ENGINEERS, LOCAL UNION No. 665, AFL, PETITIONER Case No. 5-PC-340.-Decided November 9, 19.49 DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION Upon a petition duly filed, a hearing was held before LeRoy W. C. Mather, hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed. Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the National Labor Relations Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a 'three-member panel [Members Houston, Reynolds, and Murdock]. Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds: 1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of the National Labor Relations Act. 2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent certain em- ployees of the Employer. 3. A question affecting commerce exists concerning the repre- sentation of employees of the Employer within the meaning of Section 9 (c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act. 4. The Petitioner seeks a unit composed of the Employer's power- house and filter-plant employees, excluding all other employees, cler- ical workers, guards, watchmen, professional employees, and all super- visors as defined in the Act. The Textile Workers Union of America, Local 202, CIO, herein called the Intervenor, moved to dismiss the petition contending that the employees in the proposed unit should not be severed from the current contractual bargaining unit because the operations at the Employer's plant are highly integrated. Further, the Intervenor contends that the long history of collective bargaining on a more comprehensive basis shows the powerhouse em- ployees to have always been adequately represented in all matters per- taining to wages, working conditions, and other conditions of employ- ment. For these reasons, the Intervenor claims that.the appropriate 87 NLRB No. 2. 4 'INDUSTRIAL' RAYON CORPORATION 5 unit should -be all employees employed in the Employer's 'plant, ex- cluding guards, office and clerical employees, laboratory employees, and all supervisors as defined in the Act. The motion to dismiss is denied for reasons hereinafter discussed. The Employer, while not I aking a position as to whether or not the unit is appropriate for sep- arate bargaining purposes, would have the unit described as. all hourly employees in the powerhouse and filter plant, excluding guards, office and clerical employees, laboratory employees, technical staff and sal- aried employees, and all supervisors as defined in the Act. The Employer, a Delaware corporation, has its principal office and place of business in Cleveland, Ohio. It is engaged in the manufac- ture, sale, and distribution of tubular knitted rayon fabric at plants located in Cleveland and Planesville, Ohio, and Covington, Virginia. This proceeding concerns only the Covington, Virginia, plant. The Employer in its operation of the Covington Plant, maintains in separate buildings the powerhouse, filter plant, pump house, pulp, storage, and the chemical and spinning operations. The powerhouse furnishes all utilities, steam and electricity, for the entire plant opera- tion.. The filter plant is considered a part of the powerhouse. The water softening operation originates in the powerhouse where is also located the refrigeration unit. Live steam is first manufactured in the powerhouse, after which, at 250-pound pressure, it goes to the powerhouse turbines to generate electricity for both the powerhouse and the main plant. The filter-plant operation controls the water flow from the pump house building to the filter plant itself. ,This water is used in both the powerhouse and the main plant operations; ap- proximately 80 percent goes to the main plant and 20 percent to the powerhouse. The refrigeration unit provides cooling for processing work performed in the main building. The main plant cannot func- tion without the steam, electricity, and refrigeration manufactured in the powerhouse and the filtered water produced in the filter plant. Both the powerhouse and the filter plant come under the same direct supervision, which, in turn, is separate from the remainder of the plant.' By contractual agreement between the Employer and the Intervenor, notice of job openings in the powerhouse are posted in other sections of the plant. Any employee may bid for the job. The job opening is given to the employee with the most seniority and best qualifications as determined by the Employer and the Intervenor. Failure on their part to agree on the employee choice results in the entire matter going There are 34 employees in the requested unit as follows : Firemen, refrigeration oper- ators, filter-plant operators , mechanics , assistant firemen, switchboard operators , utility operators , locomotive crane operator , auxiliary operators, and assistant mechanics. All of these employees are hourly paid. 6 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD to arbitration for final settlement. The employee finally selected is then transferred to the powerhouse for a probationary period of 2 months, where he begins work at the most menial task. Immediately after the end of the probationary period, the transferred employee is permitted to retain 50 percent of the seniority rights acquired in the main plant. The testimony discloses that there has been a personnel turn-over of only two employees in the powerhouse in the past 7 years. From these facts, and from the complete record, it is clear that the interests of the powerhouse and filter-plant employees 2 are distin- guishable from those of the other employees. It appears that these employees are a distinct and homogeneous group and their work is essentially the same as that generally performed by powerhouse em- ployees in other industrial plants. The mere fact that a substantial amount of steam is consumed in the production process does not estab- lish the degree of integration between powerhouse and filter-plant operations and the production process which would warrant denying the first group separate representation.3 Neither steam nor com- pressed air is a component of the end product itself.4 In a similar case recently decided, we pointed out that this factor alone does not meet the degree of integration of operations deemed necessary before a severance request of an otherwise appropriate voting group would be denied.5 As to the effect of the plant-wide system of seniority,. the record shows that the benefits are partial and dependent on qualifi- cations and length of service in the particular classification. It ap- pears clear that the transfers based upon the workings of the seniority system have had no appreciable effect in destroying the identity of the separate employee group. The history of collective bargaining between the Intervenor and the Employer began in 1937,6 and apparently has continued from that time to the present. However, we seldom deny self-determination to powerhouse employees solely on the ground that the employees in such a unit have been included in more comprehensive bargaining units, when we are, as here, dealing with a functional group which has tra- 2 The employees responsible for the operation of the equipment which furnishes refrigera- tion , compressed air, and water for use in the production process are usually grouped for bargaining purposes with powerhouse employees . The operation of such equipment is generally recognized to be part of the functions of powerhouse employees . Bloomingdale Brothers, Inc., 81 NLRB 1252 ; Swift and Company, 81 NLRB 333 ; Wilson & Co., Inc., 80 NLRB 1463. 3 Baugh and Sons Company, 82 NLRB 1399. 'Aluminum Ore Company, 85 NLRB 121 ; Worthy Paper Company Association, 80 NLRB 19. 5 See Baugh and Sons Company, supra, and discussion therein. 6 Industrial Rayon Corporation, a Delaware Corporation, 7 NLRB 878. INDUSTRIAL RAYON CORPORATION Z ditionally been accorded separate representation.? Accordingly, we believe that, despite the history of collective bargaining at the Em- ployer's Covington plant on a different basis," the employees in the proposed unit may appropriately constitute a separate bargaining unit. However, they may with equal appropriateness be included in the .larger unit of production and maintenance employees. We find that all powerhouse and filter-plant employees at the Em- ployer's Covington, Virginia, plant, excluding all other employees, clerical workers, guards, watchmen, professional employees, and all supervisors as defined in the Act, may constitute a unit appro- priate for the purposes of collective bargaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act. However, we shall make no final unit de- termination at this time, but shall first ascertain the desires of these employees as expressed in the election hereinafter directed. If the majority vote for the Petitioner, they will be taken to have indicated their desire to constitute a separate bargaining unit represented by the Petitioner. If they vote for the Intervenor, they will be taken to have indicated their desire to remain part of the larger unit represented by the Intervenor. DIRECTION OF ELECTION As part of the investigation to ascertain representatives for the pur- poses of collectivebargaining with the Employer, an election by secret ballot shall be conducted as early as possible, but not later than 30 days from the date of this Direction, under the direction and supervision ,of the Regional Director for the Region in which this case was heard, and subject to Sections 203.61 and 203.62 of National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations, among the employees in the unit found appropriate in paragraph numbered 4, above, who were employed during the. pay-roll period immediately preceding the date of this Direction of Election, including employees who did not work during said pay-roll period because they were ill or on vacation or temporarily laid off, 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, and also excluding employees on strike who are not entitled to reinstatement, to determine whether they desire to be represented, for purposes of collective bargaining, by International Union of Operating Engineers., Local Union No. 665, AFL, or by Tex- tile Workers of America, Local 202, CIO, or by neither. ' Armstrong Cork Company, 80 NLRB 859 ; Worthy Paper Company Association, supra; Bloomingdale Brothers, Inc., supra ; Kendall Mills-Finishing Division of The Kendall Company, 77 NLRB 385; The American Sugar Refining Company, 76 NLRB 1009. 8 Testimony in the record reveals that the Petitioner has bargaining agreements with the Employer at the Painesville and Cleveland , Ohio, plants for identically the same employees as requested in the instant petition.