Milk Products Manufacturers' Association

In the Matter Of MILK PRODUCTS MANUFACTURERS' ASSOCIATION, FOR AND IN BEHALF OF THE BORDEN COMPANY (MODESTO), CARNATION COMPANY (GUSTINE), AND SEGO MILK PRODUCTS COMPANY (SALINAS), EMPLOYER and INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MACHIN- ISTS, DISTRICT LODGE No. 41 AND DISTRICT LODGE No. 93, PETITIONER Case No. 20-RC-624.-Decided January 30, 1950 DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION Upon a petition duly filed, a hearing was held before Louis S. Pen- field, hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed. Pusuant 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 [Chairman Herzog and Members Houston and Reynolds]. 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 representa- tion 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 to represent a unit composed of all produc- tion and maintenance employees in the can shops of the Borden Com- pany plant at Modesto, the Carnation Company plant at Gustine, and the Sego Milk Products plant at Salinas, including maintenance machinists in the boiler rooms of all three plants. As alternatives, listed as follows in the order of the Petitioner's preference, it requests a unit of (1) can shop employees in the three plants and a separate unit of maintenance machinists in the three boiler rooms; or (2) can shop employees in the three plants and a separate unit of maintenance machinists in the Carnation boiler room; or (3) can shop employees I The Employer is an association of milk products manufacturers in California. 8S NLRB No. 80. 317 318 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD in the three plants. The Employer and the Intervenors 2 contend that the only appropriate unit consists of production and maintenance employees in the three can shops, i. e., the unit requested as the Peti- tioner's third alternative. The Employer represents for collective bargaining purposes the owners of some 60 milk products manufacturing plants. Only 3 of these plants (Borden, Carnation, and Sego) produce condensed and evaporated milk for which the cans are made at the respective plants. They are the only members of the Employer involved in this pro- ceeding. All three plants are similar in organization and operation. Raw milk is delivered to the condenseries where it is processed in cookers heated by steam, and then canned. The steam is supplied from boilers located in boiler rooms separate from both the condenseries and the can shops. The can shops manufacture cans for use in canning the products of the respective condenseries, and for sale to other plants which do not have their own can shops. Each can shop has production employees engaged in making tin cans. In addition, there is a crew of maintenance machinists who work only in the can shop under the supervision of the can shop super- intendent. Each can shop has its own fully equipped machine shop. As the can shop machines are complex, and operate at high speeds, their maintenance and repair require specialized skills. The condensery machines, on the other hand, are relatively simple and do not require the work of the same type of highly specialized machinists. The maintenance crews for the conden series work out of the boiler rooms under supervision of the chief engineers. Their work is varied. In addition to repairing and making parts for the con- densery machines, they do plumbing, pipe fitting, electrical work, and concrete laying. There is no interchange between the two mainte- nance groups, although on occasion boiler room machinists may use the tools in the'can shop machine shop to do a job that cannot be done in their own less fully equipped machine shop.:' Among the boiler room employees, however, there is some interchange in that the men who tend the boilers occasionally do minor repair jobs on the condensery machines when it is possible to bring the work into the boiler rooms. 2 International Brotherhood of Teamsters , Chauffeurs , Warehousemen and Helpers of America, AFL, herein called the Teamsters, and International Union of Operating Engineers, Stationary Local 39, AFL, herein called the Operating Engineers, intervened in the pro- ceeding only to resist the Petitioner' s claim to represent the boiler room maintenance machinists. The Intervenors make no claim to represent the can shop employees. a The record indicates that this is the practice only at the Carnation plant. Borden and Sego employ outside contractors for condensery repair work that cannot be done in the boiler room machine shop. MILK PRODUCTS MANUFACTURERS' ASSOCIATION 319 The three can shops operate only 5 days a week, whereas the con- denseries and boiler rooms work on a 7-day schedule. Each can shop has its own payroll and shop superintendent. Although the employees in the condenseries and boiler rooms are not under the same immediate 'supervision, they are on the same payroll and, insofar as the main- tenance crews are concerned, operate in each plant as an integrated department. The record shows that for several years the Employer has bargained with the Operating Engineers for all boiler room employees in all the member plants, with the Teamsters for employees in all the con- denseries, and with the Petitioner for production and maintenance employees in the can shops involved herein. The coverage clause in the contract with the Petitioner reads as follows : Section 1 (a). The Employer shall recognize the Union as the sole Collective Bargaining Agency of all employees within its jurisdiction, or eligible to membership therein . . . . Despite this clause, boiler room machinists at both Borden and Sego have always been included in the boiler room unit represented by the Operating Engineers. A more. ambiguous situation exists at Carna- tion which did not join the Employer until 1946. In that plant, four of the nine boiler room machinists are members of the Petitioner and are paid at the rate provided for machinists in the can shop contract. In all other respects, the four enjoy the benefits of the Operating Engineers' contract. The other five machinists are members of the Operating Engineers and are paid at the machinists rate listed in the contract of that labor organization. This bargaining history does not justify joining the boiler room machinists with can shop employees or setting them up in a separate unit, Bargaining with the Employer has been on a departmental and not on a craft basis. Machinists in the can shop have been in- cluded with production and maintenance employees in that depart- ment; boiler room machinists have similarly, except in the confused situation at Carnation, been included in the same unit with other boiler room employees. To join machinists in the boiler room with a produc- tion and maintenance unit of can shop employees would be to estab- lish neither a departmental nor a craft unit. A separate unit of some or all boiler room machinists would also be inappropriate because it would include some, but not all members of the machinists craft em- ployed by the Employer.4 The third alternative unit suggested by 4Ethyl Corporation ( Sodium and Tetraethyl Lead Areas), 80 NLRB 9; Teletype Corpo- ration, 79 NLRB 1044; Shell Oil Company, Incorporated, 79 NLRB 618 ; International Harvester Company, 77 NLRB 520. 320 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD the Petitioner, a unit of can shop employees, conforms with the unit now represented by the Petitioner and, as the Employer and the In- tervenor agree, is appropriate. Accordingly, we find that all production and maintenance employees in the can shop at the Borden Company plant, Modesto, California; the Carnation Company plant, Gustine, California; and the Sego Milk Products Company plant, Salinas, California, excluding all other employees and supervisors as defined in the Act, constitute a unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act. DIRECTION OF ELECTION 5 As part of the investigation to ascertain representatives for the pur- poses of collective bargaining with the Employer, an election by secret oallot shall be conducted as early as possible, but not later than 30 days from the-date of this Direction, under the direction and super- vision 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 payroll period immediately preceding the date of this Direction of Election, including employees who did not work during said payroll 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 rein- stated prior to the date of the election, and also excluding employees on strike who are not entitled to reinstatement, to determine whether or not they desire to be represented, for purposes of collective bargain- ing, by International Association of Machinists, District Lodge No. 41 and District Lodge No. 93. 5 The compliance status of District Lodge No. 93 has lapsed since the hearing in this matter. The Regional Director is herewith instructed to delete District Lodge No. 93 from the ballot in the election directed herein if District Lodge No. 93 has not, within 2 weeks from this date, renewed its compliance with Section 9 (f), (g), and (h). No election -shall be scheduled within the 2-week period allowed until and unless compliance has been determined. r