Eskaton American River Healthcare Center

ESKATON AMERICAN RIVER HEALTHCARE CENTER 755 Eskaton, d/b/a Eskaton American River Healthcare Center and Hospital and Institutional Workers Lo- cal 250, Service Employees International Union, AFL-CIO, Petitioner Eskaton, d/b/a Eskaton American River Healthcare Center, Employer-Petitioner and International Union of Operating Engineers, Stationary Local 39, AFL-CIO. Cases 20-RC-12455 and 20-RM-1820 July 27, 1976 DECISION ON REVIEW, ORDER, AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION BY CHAIRMAN MURPHY AND MEMBERS FANNING AND JENKINS The instant request for review by Local 39 1 in- volves Case 20-RC-12455, in which SEIU 2 seeks to represent, at the Employer's hospital, a unit of ser- vice and maintenance employees, including mainte- nance department employees, and Case 20-RM- 1820, in which Local 39 seeks to represent a separate unit of the Employer's maintenance department em- ployees. These cases were originally part of a broader proceeding which also included Case 20-RC-12332, in which CAMLT 3 petitioned for a unit of the Employer's medical laboratory technicians, and Case 20-RC-12463, in which CNA ° petitioned for a unit of the Employer's nurses. On May 23, 1975, the Regional Director for Re- gion 20 issued her Decision, Order and Direction of Elections, in which she directed elections in units of professional employees, including medical laboratory technicians, in Case 20-RC-12332, of service and maintenance employees in Case 20-RC-12455, and of nurses in Case 20-RC-12463, but found inappro- priate the separate maintenance department unit urged by Local 39 in Case 20-RM-1820 and ordered dismissal of the petition. Thereafter, in accordance with Section 102.67 of the National Labor Relations Board's Rules and Regulations, Series 8, as amended, Local 39 filed a request for review of the Regional Director's Decision in Cases 20-RC-12455 and 20- RM-1820, asserting that her finding as to the inap- propriateness of the maintenance department unit in Case 20-RM-1820 was clearly erroneous and depart- 1 International Union of Operating Engineers, Stationary Local 39, AFL- CIO 2 Hospital and Institutional Workers Local 250, Service Employees Inter- national Union, AFL-CIO 3 California Association for Medical Laboratory Technology Engineers and Scientists of California (MEBA, AFL-CIO) California Nurses Association ed from officially reported Board precedent. The Employer filed a reply brief. On June 19, 1975, the National Labor Relations Board, by telegraphic order, denied separately filed requests for review in Cases 20-RC-12332 and 20- RC-12463, but granted Local 39's request for review in Cases 20-RC-12455 and 20-RM-1820 and stayed the election directed by the Regional Director in Case 20-RC-12455, pending the outcome of the in- stant Decision on Review. Thereafter the Employer and Local 39 filed supplemental briefs. Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, the Na- tional Labor Relations Board has delegated its au- thority in this proceeding to a three-member panel. The Board has considered Local 39's request for review, the briefs, and the entire record in this case with respect to the issues under review and makes the following findings: I The Employer is a nonprofit California corpora- tion engaged in the operation of a 250-bed acute care hospital in Carmichael, California, with approxi- mately 400 employees. The hospital is centrally ad- ministered and has uniform policies covering labor relations, wages, benefits, and conditions of employ- ment. It comprises four administrative units known as fiscal services, nursing services, hospital services, and professional services. The maintenance department, under hospital serv- ices, is responsible for the repair, servicing, and maintenance of hospital equipment, including heat- ing, air-conditioning, medical gas, oxygen, pneumat- ic communication, and various other types of hospi- tal equipment. It also engages in general remodeling, gardening, cleaning, service, and other maintenance functions. The maintenance department includes a plant operations division and a plant maintenance division.6 These divisions have six mechanics each; in addition, the plant maintenance division has a paint- er and a storekeeper. The six plant operations divi- sion maintenance mechanics are primarily responsi- ble for maintaining the operation of boilers and allied steam equipment in the boilerroom. The six plant maintenance division mechanics may work in the boilerroom, but appear to spend more of their time in other hospital areas performing a variety of maintenance duties. Plant operations division main- tenance mechanics, however, may also perform du- ties throughout the hospital which may or may not 5 Our Decision herein directing an election renders it unnecessary to pass upon the Employer's motion for an expedited election in the maintenance department unit sought in Case 20-RM-1820 It also includes a security division and a grounds division The security division is a contract service For the past year and a half the grounds division work has been performed by a contract service Although the Em- ployer represents that it intends to hire groundsmen, none were involved in this proceeding 225 NLRB No. 97 756 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD be directly related to their boilerroom work, provid- ed only that the boilerroom, a 24-hour-a-day opera- tion, is continuously manned by at least one plant operations division maintenance mechanic. These duties include boilerroom-related functions such as taking hourly temperature readings, but may also in- clude functions which are not more related to the general maintenance of the hospital's physical plant, such as bed repair, changing lights, and preparing signs. In hiring maintenance mechanics, the Employer seeks persons with 3 or more years of general experi- ence in operating physical plant equipment such as steam boilers, air-conditioning systems, related con- trols, and basic building trades skills pertaining thereto, as well as skills in the fields of carpentry, plumbing, mechanical, and electrical work. Qualifications for maintenance mechanics' jobs do not include the completion of an apprenticeship pro- gram in boiler maintenance, journeyman status, or licensure. Yet the Employer is desirous of hiring em- ployees with such credentials. Two of the mainte- nance department employees are journeyman sta- tionary engineers, two are journeyman carpenters, and one is a journeyman electrician; the remainder, though skilled and with varying backgrounds of for- mal technical education and job experience, are not skilled in any particular trades. Most of the major repair work is contracted out, due to the relatively small size of the maintenance mechanics force, equipment warranties, lack of li- censing, or lack of suitable repair equipment. Items so repaired include business machinery, defibrilla- tors, electronic and nuclear equipment, respiratory equipment, boiler equipment, air-conditioning, and generator equipment. Respiratory services personnel calibrate some electrical equipment, and nurses cal- ibrate other equipment. The maintenance department employees are under separate immediate supervision. They alone are re- sponsible for the operation and maintenance of the high-pressure steam boilers and related equipment, and servicing complex and sophisticated equipment such as medical oxygen equipment, the medical gas system, the air-conditioning system, and the heating system. They also engage in general building remo- deling. On other hospital equipment they share the repair work with other service employees as, for in- stance, in the cardio-pulmonary laboratory, where they perform certain minor repairs while the cardio- pulmonary technicians perform other repairs; major repairs therein are contracted out. The same situa- tion obtains as to repairs in the clinical laboratory and the radiology department. In performing less skilled tasks, the maintenance mechanics may also contact and work with other em- ployees. For example, they may assist nurse techi- cians in repair work and the storeroom clerk in as- sembling new furniture. Together with the house- keeping employees in the hospital services unit, they move heavy equipment, replace light bulbs, hang pic- tures, fabricate signs, repair beds, and perform clean- ing operations. Together with purchasing personnel, they unload supplies. Although, as noted above, they are separately supervised, they may on occasion be subject to the call of individuals in the nursing de- partment and in administration. In 1968, the Employer voluntarily recognized Sac- ramento County Hospital Workers Union, herein called SCHWU, as the exclusive bargaining repre- sentative of the Employer's maintenance mechanics, excluding the painter and the storekeeper. This rec- ognition has been continuous and the latest contract between the Employer and SCHWU was effective from December 16, 1973, to December 15, 1974. On August 22, 1974, SCHWU notified the Employer in writing that it was merging its assets with those of Local 39, that a majority of the employees sought membership in Local 39, and that Local 39 intended to assume the contract. Local 39 continues to claim representation for the maintenance mechanics not- withstanding the Employer's assertion that since Au- gust 22, 1974, there have been no collective-bargain- ing negotiations between it and SCHWU. A maintenance unit may be appropriate if an ap- plication of the Board's traditional standards estab- lishes that the employees have a sufficiently separate community of interest to warrant such a finding. In determining whether a sufficiently separate commu- nity of interest exists, the Board looks to such factors as mutuality of interests in wages and hours, com- monality of supervision, skills and functions, infre- quency of contact with other employees, lack of in- terchange and functional integration, and area practice and patterns of bargaining.' Weighing these factors, Chairman Murphy and Member Fanning conclude that the maintenance mechanics herein sought possess a sufficiently sepa- rate community of interest to warrant their represen- tation in a separate bargaining unit. In so doing, they rely on the maintenance mechanics' separate supervi- sion; their sole responsibility for operating and main- taining the boilerroom on a 24-hour-a-day basis; their craftlike skills; the fact that they are among the 7 Jewish Hospital Association of Cincinnati d/b/a Jewish Hospital of Cincin- nati, 223 NLRB 614 (1976) (Chairman Murphy and Member Fanning dis- senting as to the application of the traditional unit criteria), Riverside Meth- odist Hospital, 223 NLRB 1084 (1976) (Chairman Murphy and Member Fanning dissenting as to the application of the traditional unit criteria) St Vincent's Hospital, 223 NLRB 638 (1976) ESKATON AMERICAN RIVER HEALTHCARE CENTER highest paid service employees at the Employer's hospital ; their work on certain of the complex and specialized hospital machines, which they alone maintain, using their own tools;' and an uninterrupt- ed 6-year bargaining history for maintenance me- chanics at the Employer's hospital. In weighing the factors to be considered in de- termining whether or not an employee group possess- es a sufficient community of interest to justify its sep- arate representation, Member Jenkins notes that although a nucleus of the maintenance mechanics is primarily engaged in powerhouse -type operations, both they and the other maintenance employees per- form functions throughout the hospital in the course of which they have numerous work contacts with other similarly or lesser skilled hospital personnel and perform many functions together with other ser- vice employees or similar to the functions performed by them. These circumstances, for reasons set forth in his opinion in Jewish Hospital, supra, and Shriners Hospitals for Crippled Children, 217 NLRB 806 (1975), would ordinarily persuade him to deny sepa- rate representation .9 However, in view of the bar- gaining history involving a separate unit of mainte- nance mechanics not being a factor in those cases,10 he concurs in the result reached by Chairman Mur- phy and Member Fanning. 8 See dissents of Chairman Murphy and Member Fanning in St Joseph Hospital, 224 NLRB No. 47 ( 1976), and Riverside Methodist Hospital, 223 NLRB 1084 ( 1976). 9 See also The Baptist Memorial Hospital, 224 NLRB No 51 (1976), St Joseph Hospital, supra, and Riverside Methodist Hospital, supra " The Board has long held that it will not disturb an established bargain- ing relationship unless required to do so by the dictates of the Act or other compelling circumstances The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company, Inc, 153 NLRB 1549, 1550 (1965) 757 Accordingly, we find that the following employees of the Employer constitute an appropriate unit for purposes of collective bargaining within the meaning of Section 9(b) of the Act: All maintenance department employees at the Employer's Carmichael, California, hospital, in- cluding the painter and the storekeeper," but ex- cluding office clericals, managerial employees, guards, watchmen, all other employees, and su- pervisors as defined in the Act. ORDER It is hereby ordered that the petition in Case 20- RM-1820, be, and the same hereby is, reinstated. IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that in Case 20-RC-12455 Unit C, as set forth in the Regional Director's Deci- sion of May 23, 1975, be, and the same hereby is, amended by deleting the words "maintenance me- chanics." IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the Direction of Elec- tions, as set forth in the Regional Director's Decision on May 23, 1975, be, and the same hereby is, amend- ed so as to provide that the election in Unit C, as amended, in Case 20-RC-12455 be conducted as early as possible, but not later than 30 days from the date of this Decision on Review, Order, and Direc- tion of Election. [Direction of Election and Excelsior footnote omit- ted from publication.] ii We include the painter and the storekeeper , in view of Local 39's will- ingness to represent them and the fact that their inclusion in the mainte- nance department unit is more appropriate than in the overall maintenance and service unit