Landis Machine Co.

628 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD employees, professional employees, guards, and all supervisors as defined in the Act. (6) All office and clerical employees, charwomen, and elevator oper- ators of Joseph Brothers Furniture Company, excluding the office manager, all other employees,16 professional employees, guards, and all supervisors as defined in the Act. [Text of Direction of Elections omitted from publication in this volume.] 16 It was stipulated by the Petitioner and this Employer that Norma Jean McCurdy was not an employee and, accordingly , should not be included in the unit. LANDIS MAOIIINE COMPANY and DISTRICT No. 9, INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MACHINISTS, AFL, PETITIONER. Case No. 14-RC- 1883. November 26, 1952 Decision and Direction of Election Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor Relations Act, a hearing was held before Ralph E. Kennedy, 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 Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-mem- ber panel [Members Houston, Murdock, and Styles]. Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds : 1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of the Act. 2. The labor organization involved claims 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 sever from the existing production and maintenance unit, which has been represented by the Intervenor since about 1946, a unit of all toolroom employees at the Employer's St. Louis, Missouri, plant, including two tool grinders working in the milling machine department. In the alternative, the Petitioner is willing to accept any variation of the requested unit which the Board may find appropriate. The Employer and the Intervenor contend that the unit sought by the Petitioner is inappropriate. I United Steelworkers of America, CIO, was permitted to intervene on the basis of its contractual interest. 101 NLRB No. 121. LANDIS MACHINE COMPANY 629 The Employer is engaged in the manufacture of shoe repair machin- ery. The employees involved herein include about eight tool makers, six tool grinders, three lathe hands, one machine hand, three machine repairmen, three building maintenance men, two laborers, one tool crib attendant. With the exception of two grinders, who are in the milling machine department , these employees are stationed in the tool- room under the supervision of their own foreman. The toolroom, a department on the second floor separated from the rest of the plant by a rail, contains such machines as lathes , millers, shapers, drill presses, grinders, and jig bores. The tool makers operate the various machines in the toolroom and for the most part use their own drawings to make or repair jigs, fixtures, and tools. In addition, individual tool makers have certain duties involving welding, needle plate, and experimentation on special parts. Although they perform the greater part of their work in the toolroom, the tool makers go into the production departments to set up or check on the operation of fixtures and parts, and to test the efficiency of stitcher and finisher machines . The lathe hands also work from blueprints and do all lathe work for the toolroom including jobs on special screws, bushings, arbors, and studs . The four toolroom grinders 2 do milling work as well as various types of precision grind- ing, including tool, cylindrical, and internal grinding . In connection with their work they also seek out in the production departments those imperfect fixtures which need grinding. The two milling machine de- partment grinders, who are located outside of the toolroom , do similar precision tool grinding which is of a nonproduction nature. A ma- chine hand operates the jig bore in the toolroom and he occasionally is given production assignments . The machine repairmen devote part of their time in the toolroom to machining parts for replacement purposes and the rest of their day is spent in the plant repairing machines. The building maintenance men are primarily responsible for maintaining the plant . They also occasionally operate machines in the toolroom and work in conjunction with the machine repairmen. One laborer in the toolroom operates the cutoff saw, while the other has such assignments as cleaning machines and running errands for the toolroom foremen. The tool crib attendant furnishes the entire plant, including the toolroom , with tools. In the event of layoffs , tool makers cannot be "bumped" by any employees in the plant. Although there is plant-wide seniority for all Ether employees, no toolroom employees have been transferred to production jobs. When times are slack, production employees are occasionally brought into the toolroom to do machine repair or gen- eral toolroom work . Despite the absence of a formal apprenticeship 2 Some of the toolroom grinders are referred to as toolroom machine hands. 630 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD program, the toolroom employees generally have received their train- ing and acquired their skills in the toolroom while working for the Employers The toolroom employees in contrast to most of the pro- duction employees are paid on an hourly rather than on a piecework basis. In view of the substantial nucleus of skilled craftsmen in the tool- room, and the fact that there are no comparable craftsmen elsewhere in the plant, we find that the toolroom employees constitute a group that may, if they so desire, properly constitute a separate bargaining unit, notwithstanding their prior inclusion in an over-all unit of production and maintenance employees.4 The fact that they have occasion to work in the production departments does not militate against their separate representation on a toolroom department basis, for it is clear that they do little production work as such.s As the laborers, tool crib attendant, and one of the building maintenance men, who acts as a part-time chauffeur, work in close association with the skilled toolroom employees under the same supervision and in the same department, we shall include these employees in the voting groups However, we shall exclude the two grinders in the milling machine department because they are separately supervised and are not part of the toolroom department. We shall make no final determination with respect to the appro- priate unit, but we shall direct an election in a voting group consisting of all toolroom department employees at the Employer's St. Louis, Missouri, plant, including tool makers, lathe hands, grinders, machine hand, machine repairmen, building maintenance men, laborers, and tool crib attendant, but excluding milling machine department grind- ers, office and clerical employees, guards, watchmen, professional em- ployees, all other employees, and all supervisors z as defined in the Act. If a majority of the employees in the voting group select the Peti- tioner, they will be taken to have indicated their desire to constitute a separate unit, and the Regional Director conducting the election di- rected herein is instructed to issue a certification of representatives to the Petitioner for the unit above which the Board, under such circum- stances, finds to be appropriate for purposes of collective bargaining. In the event a majority vote for the Intervenor, the Board finds that they may continue to be represented as part of the existing produc- P One tool maker was already experienced at the time he was hired by the Employer. ' The Reliance Electric d Engineering Company , 98 NLRB 488 ; The Rau land Corporation, 97 NLRB 1333; The General Electric Company, 89 NLRB 726, 744. Cf. Westinghouse Electric Corporation , 101 NLRB 441. 6 The Cornelius Company, 93 NLRB 368. 6 The Rauland Corporation, supra; Sargent d Company, 95 NLRB 1515. ' The record shows , and we find , that the chief machine repairman , Walter Kopp, the chief building maintenance man, Al Seep, and the chief tool maker, Ernest Von Leffern, are not supervisors within the meaning of the Act. HEKMAN FURNITURE COMPANY 631 Lion and maintenance unit, and the Regional Director will issue a certification of results of election to such effect. [Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this volume.] EEKMAN FURNITURE COMPANY and UNITED FURNITURE WORKERS OF AMERICA, CIO. Case No. 7-CA-659. November 26, 1952 Decision and Order On April 29, 1952, Trial Examiner George A. Downing issued his Intermediate Report in the above-entitled proceeding, finding that the Respondent had engaged in and was engaging in certain unfair labor practices, and recommending that it cease and desist therefrom and take certain affirmative action, as set forth in the copy of the Inter- mediate Report attached hereto. Thereafter, the Respondent filed exceptions to the Intermediate Report, and a supporting brief 1 The Board 2 has reviewed the rulings made by the Trial Examiner at the hearing and finds that no prejudicial error was committed. The rulings are hereby affirmed. The Board has considered the Interme- diate Report, the Respondent's exceptions and brief, and the entire record in the case, and hereby adopts the findings, conclusions, and recommendations of the Trial Examiner, with the following modifica- tions and additions.3 The Respondent contends that the Union's requests for individual wage rates, wage ranges, and individual job classifications should have been processed through the grievance procedure set forth in the collective-bargaining agreement. That contract provides for process- ing through the grievance procedure, inter alia, any "complaints or charges upon matters which have not been made the subject of this agreement and which have not been made the subject of collective bargaining." As the Union did not submit the question of furnishing of wage data to the grievance procedure, the Respondent contends that the Union has, in effect, waived its right to complain of the Re- spondent's failure to furnish such data. However, the Board has held that "the collective bargaining requirement of the Act" is not satis- % The Respondent 's request for oral argument is hereby denied, as the record , including the exceptions and brief, in our opinion, adequately presents the issues and the positions of the parties. 2 Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-member panel [Chairman Herzog and Members Styles and Peterson]. a The Intermediate Report contains a typographical error, which is corrected as follows : the citation for Leland-Gi fford Company should be 95 NLRB 1306. 101 NLRB No. 119.