Fisher Corp., Ltd.

504 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD Fisher Corporation, Ltd. and Amalgamated Lithographers of America Local 62, Petitioner. Case No. 37-RC-602. August 8, 1960 DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTIONS Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor Relations Act, a hearing was held before David E. Davis, 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 [Chairman Leedom and Members Bean and Fanning]. 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 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 Employer is engaged in commercial printing and the sale of office supplies. The Petitioner seeks to represent a unit composed of lithographic production employees including offset pressmen and camera department employees. The offset pressmen, together with letterpressmen, are currently represented by Honolulu Printing Pressmen & Assistants' Union, Local 413, AFL-CIO (herein called Pressmen). The camera department employees are now represented as a separate unit by Hawaii Photo Engravers Union, Local 109, AFL-CIO (herein called Photo Engravers). The Pressmen and Photo Engravers maintain that the requested unit is not appropriate. The Employer contends that all pressmen should be in the same unit. The Employer's entire printing operation is located on one floor of its building. Both offset pressman and letterpressmen are in the press department, under the supervision of a single foreman. Orig- inally the Employer had letterpresses only. Offset presses, including multilith, a Miehle 29, and an Ebco, were acquired later, and some of the letterpressmen were trained in their operation. Employees are now regularly assigned as either letterpressmen or offset pressmen. There is interchange only during vacation and rush periods, when 'Honolulu Printing Pressmen & Assistants' Union, Local 413, AFL-CIO, and Hawaii Photo Engravers Union, Local 109, AFL-CIO, intervened on the basis of their contracts covering employees in the requested unit. 128 NLRB No. 65. FISHER CORPORATION, LTD. 505 offset pressmen operate letterpresses and letterpressmen operate mul- tilith presses, but not the more complicated Miehle 29 or Ebco. Camera department employees are engaged in various photoengrav- ing aspects of the lithographic production process-stripping, plat- ing, and camera work. There is a system of progression which requires 4 years' training for platemaker, 5 for stripper, and 6 for camera leader. There are four trainees in this department. The camera department is under the overall supervision of the foreman of the composition department.2 The requested unit of offset pressmen and camera department em- ployees clearly constitutes a traditional group of lithographic produc- tion employees who the Board holds may, if they so desire, be repre- sented in a single combined unit where, as here, the Petitioner is a traditional representative of such employee.' However, as the camera department employees have been separately represented, they are, under established Board policy, entitled to a self-determination elec- tion before being merged in a broader unit 4 Similarly, the offset pressmen are entitled to a separate election to determine if they wish to continue being represented by the Pressmen as a part of its existing unit or by the Petitioner either as part of a unit of all lithographic employees or, if the camera department employees do not vote for the Petitioner, in a separate unit, which under such circumstances, we find may be appropriate.' We shall, therefore, direct separate elec- tions in the voting groups described below at the Employer's Hono- lulu, Hawaii, commercial printing establishment, excluding letter- pressmen, watchmen and/or guards, professional employees, all other employees, and supervisors as defined in the Act : A. All camera department employees, including camera leader, stripper, platemaker, and trainees. B. All offset pressmen. If a majority of employees in each of the voting groups vote for the Petitioner, they will be merged into a single unit which, under the circumstances, we find to be appropriate. If a majority in each vote for different unions, then the employees in voting group A shall continue to constitute a separate appropriate unit, and the employees in voting group B shall, if they vote for the Petitioner, constitute a separate appropriate unit, or, if they vote for the Pressmen, remain a part of the unit currently represented by that Union. The Regional 2 Other employees in the composition department and the bindery department are un- represented and none of the parties seek to represent them. s McCall Corporation, 118 NLRB 1332 . Contrary to the Employer , the inclusion of letterpressmen in the same unit with offset pressmen is not required by the fact that the former-do numbering and imprinting on work done by offset pressmen (Robinson Print era, Inc., 118 NLRB 518), nor by the fact that there is some interchange between employees in the two groups (National Cash Register Co., 119 NLRB 486). ' Sutherland Paper Company, 122 NLRB 1284 , 1287-1288; Tarter, Webster 1 Johnson, Inc., 121 NLRB 579; Illinois Cities Water Company, 87 NLRB 109, 111-112. 5 Sutherland Paper Company, supra. 506 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD Director is instructed to issue the appropriate certification or certifica- tions as directed by the outcome of the elections.6 [Text of Direction of Elections omitted from publication.] 6 Member Fanning agrees with the majority's finding that a unit of all lithographic production employees is appropriate for, purposes of collective bargaining However, he does not agree with the majority 's decision to certify such a unit only if the Petitioner achieves majorities in both the camera department and offset pressmen voting groups. In accordance with views he has expressed in other recent cases, he would pool the votes of the camera department employees and offset pressmen in the event they reject the unions which have represented them in the past, for such rejection makes the overall unit appropriate and the Petitioner would be entitled to certification if it obtains a majority of all the votes in that unit Waskski Biltmore, Inc., 127 NLRB 82; Cook Paint and Varnish Company, 127 NLRB 1098; Star Union Products Company, 127 NLRB 1173. Falarski Sausage Company and Sausage Makers Local #102, Amalgamated Meat Cutters & Butcher Workmen of North America, AFL-CIO. Case No. 7-CA-2502. August 9, 1960 DECISION AND ORDER On April 15, 1960, Trial Examiner Albert P. Wheatley 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 Intermediate Report attached hereto. Thereafter, the Respondent filed exceptions to the Intermediate Report and a supporting brief. Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the Act, the Board has delegated its powers in conjunction with this case to a three- member panel [Chairman Leedom and Members Bean and Fanning]. The Board 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 Inter- mediate Report, the exceptions and brief, and the entire record in this case, and hereby adopts the findings,' conclusions, and recom- mendations of the Trial Examiner, with the following modifications. We agree with the Trial Examiner that the Respondent's conduct toward Mueller and Urbanski, was discriminatorily motivated because of their activities on behalf of the Charging Union, but conclude that they were discriminatorily denied reemployment rather than dis- criminatorily terminated. We make this distinction because of the indefinite employment status of both Mueller and Urbanski. Mueller had been off work from May 12 through July 20, 1959, for an opera- tion, while Urbanski had ceased work on May 20, 1959, because of In the absence of exceptions we adopt pro forma the Trial Examiner's implied con- clusion that the Respondent did not violate Section 8(a) (4) of the Act. 128 NLRB No. 71.