Executive Air Travel, Inc.

562 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD Executive Air Travel, Inc. and International Union Allied Industrial Workers, AFL-CIO, Petitioner. Case 18-RC-9653 November 26, 1973 DECISION AND ORDER BY CHAIRMAN MILLER AND MEMBERS JENKINS AND KENNEDY Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a hearing was held before a Hearing Officer on August 30, 1973. The Regional Director then transferred the case to the Board for decision. Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, the National Labor Relations Board has delegated its authority in this proceeding to a three-member panel. The Board has reviewed the Hearing Officer's rulings made at the hearing and finds that they are free from prejudicial error. They are hereby affirmed. Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds: The Employer, Executive Air Travel, Inc., is a South Dakota corporation based in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, where it sells gas and petroleum base products to aircraft owners; sells, repairs, and stores aircraft; operates a flight training school; and provides air taxi service on a nonscheduled basis throughout the United States pursuant to a licence issued by the Federal Aviation Administration. The Employer has no interline ticketing arrangements with scheduled airlines and has carried passengers on a regular basis only during strikes affecting sched- uled carriers. The only Civil Aeronautics Board regulations applying to the Employer relate to incidental matters such as liability insurance against injury to passengers. The Employer also has approximately nine con- tracts with the United States Postal Service for the interstate transportation of air mail. To service these contracts, the Employer formed a joint venture with another air service operation, Snedigar Air Lines, and, primarily for bookkeeping purposes, the two then created another corporation, Pro Air Lines, to perform the actual mail delivery. Fifty percent of Pro's stock is owned by the Employer's stockholders and the remainder is owned by Snedigar's. Pro's only employees are 11 pilots. The Employer provides Pro managerial and maintenance services, for which it bills Pro. Pro in turn bills Snedigar and the Employer for its mail delivery services. All checks for air mail delivery are issued by the Postal Service to the Employer, which then endorses them over to Pro. Pro owns no aircraft; 5 of the approximately 12 207 NLRB No. 93 aircraft it operates are leased from the Employer, 5 are leased from Snedigar, and 2 are leased from another airline . The Employer has approximately 15 aircraft which it operates for its own use. During the first 1 i months of its current fiscal year, August 1 , 1972-July 31, 1973, the Employer derived gross revenue from the sources and in the amounts set forth beiow: Shop and parts $ 134,000 Flight line services 199,000 Sale of planes 894,000 Flight training 53,616 Charter Service 137,178 Total gross revenue $1,319,640 During the first 10 months of Pro's fiscal year, September 1, 1972, through August 31, 1973, the Employer paid Pro $576,263 for mail delivery, which apparently represents the entire amount the Employ- er received from the Postal Service, and billed Pro $16,805 for professional services, $74,080 for aircraft parts and service, and $17,337 for line service and fuel. Pro's gross income for the period included the amount it received from the Employer for mail delivery, $10,838 from charter service, $3,024 from hauling freight, and $67,898 from regularly sched- uled passenger service, which began and ended concurrently with a 3-month strike against North- west Airlines. Section 2(2) of the Act provides, in pertinent part, that the term "employer" as used in the National Labor Relations Act shall not include any person subject to the Railway Labor Act. Accordingly, because of the nature of the jurisdic- tional question presented here, we requested the National Mediation Board to study the record in this case and determine the applicability of the Railway Labor Act to the Employer. In reply, we were administratively advised by the National Mediation Board as follows: The Board has reviewed the record and exhibits submitted with your request, and has determined that Executive Air Travel, Inc. has several contracts with the United States Government for the transportation of mail by air. Under these circumstances, the National Mediation Board has concluded that Section 201 of Title 11 of the Railway Labor Act, which provides that the Act shall extend and cover every common carrier by air engaged in interstate or foreign commerce, and every carrier by air transporting mail for or under contract with the United States Govern- ment, is applicable to the operation of Executive Air Travel, Inc. EXECUTIVE AIR TRAVEL, INC. 563 In view of the foregoing, we shall dismiss the ORDER petition. It is hereby ordered that the petition in Case 18-RC-9653 be, and it hereby is, dismissed.