Welex Jet Services, Inc.

WELEX JE1 SERVICES, INC. 489 The Board has frequently considered the skills and techniques incident to the lithographic process and has held that all employees engaged in the lithographic process, form an indivisible entity for the purposes of collective bargaining and that such employees may, if they so desire, constitute a separate appropriate unit even though previously included in a broader unit.10 Multilith operators are included by the Board in such units because the multilith operation, like the Employer's herein, is essentially lithographic in character." It accordingly follows that the lithographic employees sought by the Petitioner, together with the multilith operators, may constitute a separate appropriate unit.12 However, Board policy precludes the severance of employees in the position of the offset press employees, the multi ith operators, and the cameraman, and their inclusion in a unit with other employees, without first ascertaining their desires by means of separate elections ; and before directing a self-determination election, the Board must be administratively satisfied that the peti- tioning union has sufficient representative interest in the group of employees in question.13 In the instant case, the Petitioner has failed to make the necessary showing of interest among the multilith op- erators and cameraman, although it has made an adequate showing in the offset press group. No appropriate election can therefore be held among the multilith operations and cameraman. In view thereof, and because, as indicated above, a segment of the Employer's litho- graphic employees would not constitute an appropriate, unit, we shall dismiss the petition. [The Board dismissed the petition.] 10 See, for example , McCall Corporation, 118 NLRB 1332 ; A. B. Hirschfeld Press, Inc., 96 NLRB 1068. 11 Fey Publishing Company, 108 NLRB 1031 ; The Standard Printing Company, Inc., 80 NLRB 338. 12 Petitioner is a union which traditionally represents lithographic employees. 131nternationhl Minerals & Chemical Corporation (Potash Division ), 113 NLRB 53; Penmsylvanaia Electric Company, 110 NLRB 1078 ; Combustion Engineering, Inc., Chatta- nooga Dsvssion, 114 NLRB 706 ; Mathieson Chemical Corporation, 100 NLRB 1028; New Jersey Brewers Association, 92 NLRB 1404. Welex Jet Services, Inc. and Lodge 1591, International Associ- ation of Machinists, AFL-CIO, Petitioner. Case No. 16-RC- ,2122. November 14,1957 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 William H. Henkel, Jr., hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed. 119 NLRB No. 61. 490 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD 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 [Members Murdock, Rodgers, and Bean]. 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 the employees 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 Employer is engaged in rendering an oil well wire service which consists of perforating casings and determining the porosity and permeability of the strata through which the well has been drilled. At its operation in Fort Worth, Texas, it manufactures the equipment used in performing the service. The Petitioner and the Employer agree that a production and maintenance unit is appropriate but differ as to the inclusion of certain classifications in the materials and engineering departments. Pursuant to a consent election in 1951 between the same parties herein involved, the Board certified a unit of all employees at the Fort Worth, Texas, plant, excluding. office and clerical employees, guards, watchmen, professional and technical employees, inspectors, administrative employees, and supervisors. In accordance therewith the parties maintained contractual relations until June 16, 1954. -At that time the contract terminated and no subsequent contract was negotiated. The materials department manufactures or purchases the equipment and tools needed by the field operation. The department is composed of three sections : warehouse, machine shop, and purchasing. The warehouse section is under the supervision of a foreman, and the 10 employees therein, classified as shipping and receiving clerks, perform the usual warehouse functions. The machine shop operates on two shifts with a fore-mail in charge of each shift. The purchasing sec- tion is under the direction of a purchasing agent who supervises 1 or 2 clericals who type purchase orders and do filing. Both foremen and the purchasing agent report directly to the departmental manager. The latter's office is located in the materials department office build- ing where are also located the offices of the purchasing agent and the warehouse foreman. It appears that the clericals in this office build- ing do work pertaining to warehousing duties such as maintaining inventory cards and typing bills of lading and shipping papers. The parties agree that all the employees in the warehouse section and the machine shop are production and maintenance employees properly within the unit. However, the Petitioner desires to exclude WELEX JET SERVICES, INC. 491 as office clericals the employees in the purchasing section and, ap- parently, the clericals in the materials department office building. As these clericals are located apart from the office clericals, and their work relates directly to the functions of the production and maintenance employees, we find that they are plant clericals and, consistent with our policy, include them in the unit. It was agreed by the parties, and we so find, that the departmental manager, the foreman of each sec- tion, and the purchasing agent are supervisors within the meaning of the Act. The engineering department is responsible for research and design in the development of tools and for the satisfactory production ac- cording to its specification of certain tools and equipment. It is located in a newly completed engineering building adjacent to the general office building. Employed in the department are a chief engineer, engineers, engineer-draftsmen, an experimental machinist, an experi- mental electrician, and inspectors. The parties agree that the engi- neers and the engineer-draftsmen are professional or technical em- ployees and are therefore to be excluded from the unit. The parties have not agreed as to the unit disposition of the experi- mental machinist and the experimental electrician. These two employees do no production work but direct their efforts towards the development of new devices, building prototypes of electrical instru- ments, making improvements on existing devices, and building experi- mental models. Both are under the supervision of the chief engineer who lays out their work. They have infrequent contact with pro- duction employees, and practically all machinery and tools they use are located in the engineering building. We find the interests of these employees are more closely linked with the technical and professional employees with whom they work in close association than with the production and maintenance employees. We shall exclude them.' The Employer contends, contrary to the Petitioner, that inspectors should be excluded from the production and maintenance unit on grounds that they are not production employees as evidenced by the consent election of 1951 and the bargaining history that followed, and that they exercise managerial functions relating to quality con- trol. The Employer further asserts that (a) its desire to place the responsibility for proper engineering as well as proper production in a single department resulted in the establishment of the inspection section in the engineering department, and (b) because of the close tolerance and precision required in its manufacturing process, the inspectors have been completely separated from any control on the part of production supervisors. 1 Phillips Petroleum Company, 107 NLRB 1207, at page 1211 ; Gerber Plastic Company, 108 NLRB 403. See also Delta Manufacturing Division, 89 NLRB 1434. 492 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD The inspection section is administratively within the engineering department under the immediate supervision of a chief inspector who is responsible to the chief engineer. It is physically located in a corner of the machine shop building. Practically all work done by the stationary inspectors is confined to this area where they keep the gages and manufacturing devices necessary to perform their duties. They seldom have any contact with the manufacturing employees. A roving inspector, present on each shift in the machine shop, spot checks the products and machines. After completion of an order in the machine shop, it is sent to the inspection section where each part is inspected. The inspectors work from blueprints prepared by the engineers, using micrometers and other measuring and testing instruments to determine whether the requirements of the blueprints have been met. They have the au- thority to order a part reworked or scrapped, and all scrapped parts are reinspected by the chief inspector to determine whether rework- ing is possible. When an inspector- finds a part getting out, of tol- erance, he reports such fact to the chief inspector who talks to the production foreman. In addition to inspecting the articles manu- factured by the Employer, all material purchased by the Employer and all parts manufactured for the Employer by subcontractors are inspected. The inspectors make daily reports keyed to the number of the order being inspected. These reports include the name of the article, whether it is passed or tagged as a reject, and whether the reject is to be reworked or scrapped. Although inspectors do not indi- cate on the reports the machinist who machined the rejected part, it is possible to identify the machinist by the order number or by the benchmark. The Employer's vice president stated that inspectors police the work of the production departments, that discipline of production workers can be assessed on the basis of inspectors' work, and that such reports figure in merit reviews for wage increases of production workers. However, an inspector who testified at the hear- ing was not aware that the reports were used for this purpose. The Employer fully trains the inspectors, although no evidence was submitted as to the nature and extent of such training. All inspectors have been hired from the outside. Under the above circumstances, and particularly because the inspec- tors essentially perform technical duties, are under the ultimate super- vision of the chief engineer, and have virtually no direct relationship with the production employees, we find that they are more closely allied in their interests with the technical and professional employees than with the production and maintenance employees. For these reasons, without passing on the contention that they are managerial, we shall exclude them from the unit? 2 See United States Crypsnni Company, 109 NLRB 1402. CENTRAL JUNCOS 493 There remains for consideration the unit placement of six utility employees who perform the usual janitorial duties in the section or department to which they are assigned. Two are in the machine shop and two in the vehicle fabrication and service department. In addi- tion to their regular duties, the utility men in the fabrication depart- ment run errands and occasionally drive the pickup truck. The remaining two utility men are under the supervision of the secretary- treasurer responsible for maintenance; they keep the lawns mowed and watered, and each morning wheel coffee around to all employees. We find that all the utility men belong in the production and main- tenance unit. We find that the following employees of the Employer at its plant at Fort Worth, Texas, constitute a unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act : All production and maintenance employees, including all employees in the materials department, plant clericals, and utility men, but excluding the inspectors, experimental machinist, experimental elec- trician, office clerical employees, professional and technical employees, guards, and supervisors as defined in the Act. [Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication.] Eastern Sugar Associates (a Trust) d/b/a Central Juncos and Asociacion de Empleados Semanales de la Central Juncos de Juncos, Puerto Rico, Petitioner. Case No. 24-RC-1001. November 14, 1957 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 George A. Yager, 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-member panel [Members Rodgers, Bean, and Jenkins]. 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.' 1 The Employer would not stipulate that the Petitioner is a labor organization. lie- cause the Petitioner exists for the purpose of bargaining collectively on behalf of its members with employers concerning hours, wages, and other conditions of employment, 119 NLRB No. 57.