Southern California Permanente Medical Group

110 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD Southern California Permanente Medical Group and Kaiser Sunset Registered Nurses' Association, UNAC, Petitioner. Case 31-RC-2563 February 19, 1974 DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION BY CHAIRMAN MILLER AND MEMBERS FANNING AND PENELLO Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a hearing in this case was held before Hearing Officer Max Steinfeld. 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, as amended, the National Labor Relations Board has delegated its authority in this proceeding to a three-member panel. Upon the entire record in this case, including the brief filed by the Petitioner, the Board finds: 1. Petitioner seeks to represent registered nurses employed by the Employer at its Pasadena, West Covina, East Los Angeles. Downtown, Sunset- Edgemont, and Burbank' clinics, which comprise the Sunset-Edgemont clinic complex, which in turn is part of the Sunset-Edgemont medical service facility that includes a hospital as well as the clinics. The parties stipulated that the Employer is a California for-profit partnership of physicians engaged in the practice of medicine. During the year preceding the hearing the Employer received revenues in excess of $500,000 and during the same period it purchased in excess of $50,000 in goods and supplies from concerns located outside the State of California. The Employer contends, however, that the Board should not assert jurisdiction because the Employer is a joint employer with the Kaiser Foundation Hospitals, a nonprofit corporation engaged in the business of building, equipping, and staffing hospi- tals. The Employer raised this same issue in Case 21-RC-13303 and the parties requested that the Board take judicial notice of that proceeding. The parties stipulated that, if called upon to testify in the instant proceeding, the Employer's witnesses who testified in Case 21-RC-13303 concerning the jurisdictional and appropriate unit issues would give the same testimony. and that the Board may consider their testimony in Case 21-RC-13303 in deciding the issues here. In these circumstances, and upon the entire record in the instant case and in Case 21-RC-13303, we find, for the reasons set forth in Case 21-RC-13303,2 that the Employer does not fall within the nonprofit hospital exemption of Section 2(2) of the Act. Accordingly, in view of the Employer's substantial effect on commerce, we further find that it is engaged in commerce within the meaning of the Act and that it will effectuate the policies of the Act to assert jurisdiction in this proceeding.3 2. The labor organization involved claims to represent certain of the employees of the Employer. 3. A question affecting commerce exists concern- ing the representation of certain employees of the Employer within the meaning of Section 9(c)(1) and Section 2(6) and (7) of the Act. 4. As indicated above, the Petitioner seeks to represent the registered nurses employed by the Employer at its Pasadena, West Covina, East Los Angeles, Downtown. Sunset-Edgemont, and Bur- bank clinics. The Employer takes the identical unit position that it took in Case 21-RC-13303; namely, that the appropriate unit should include registered nurses employed by the Employer and the Hospital at five of the seven medical service facilities which comprise the Kaiser Foundation Health Plan's southern California service region. The Employer stated at the hearing that the Employer's evidence on the unit issues raised in this case would be the same as the evidence presented in Case 21-RC-13303 and offered no further evidence in the instant proceeding. The Petitioner presented additional evidence as to the separate lines of authority and supervision between the Sunset-Edgemont hospital and the above-named clinics operated by the Employer, and as to the lack of interchange between the nurses employed in the hospital and those employed in such clinics. Sonia Moseley, a registered nurse employed at the Sunset-Edgemont medical center clinic, testified that the training, skills, and experienc(t of registered nurses in the hospital and clinic complex differed in certain respects and that the hours of work were different. A question also exists as to the placement of emergency room nurses employed by the Employer in the emergency room at the Sunset-Edgemont medical center. The record establishes that the emergency room operation at the Sunset-Edgemont medical center is similar to the emergency room operation in Case 21-RC-13303. The parties stipulat- ed that hospital nurses do not work in the emergency room and emergency room nurses do not work in the i At the hednng, the Petitioner amended its petition to include Burbank 3 In Case 21-RC-13303. supra, we denied the Employer's motion to as part of the unit description in accord with the Employer's position that consolidate that case with the instant case. We further deny the Employer's the Burbank clinic is part of the Sunset-Edgemont clinic complex . request herein that the Board take official notice of the proceedings in Cases 2 209 NLRB No 26, issued simultaneously herewith 20-RC-10243 and 8-CA-7259. which involve other locations 209 NLRB No. 27 SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA PERMANENTE MEDICAL GROUP hospital; that emergency room personnel make all preparations for surgery patients in the emergency room and that emergency room nurses sometimes accompany patients being admitted to the cardiac and intensive care units to the hospital room upon the patient's admission to the hospital. The parties further stipulated that there is a common parking lot for the Sunset-Edgemont hospital and clinic employ- ees and that there are three lunchrooms located in the Sunset-Edgemont medical center buildings open to all employees. On these facts, and upon the entire record in the instant case and in Case 2l-RC-13303, we find, for the reasons set forth in Case 21-RC-13303, that the following employees of the Employer constitute an III appropriate unit for the purposes of collective bargaining within the meaning of Section 9(b) of the Act: All registered nurses employed by the Employer at its Pasadena. West Covina, East Los Angeles, Downtown, Sunset-Edgemont, and Burbank, California, clinic complex, including emergency room registered nurses employed at the Sunset- Edgemont medical center, and excluding all other employees, guards, and supervisors as defined in the Act. [Direction of Election and Excelsior footnote omitted from publication.]