ACF Industries, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

May 13, 1974

210 N.L.R.B. 605 (N.L.R.B. 1974)

AMCAR DIVISION, ACF INDUSTRIES 605
Amcar Division , ACF Industries, Inc. and Local Union
505, affiliated with the International Brotherhood
of Teamsters, Chauffeurs , Warehousemen and
Helpers of America, Petitioner and United Steel-
workers of America, AFL-CIO-CLC,Petitioner.
Cases 9-RC-10284 and 9-RC-10326
May 13, 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
consolidated hearing was held before Hearing
Officer Francis A. Keenan of the National Labor
Relations Board. Following the hearing and pursuant
to Section 102.67 of the National Labor Relations
Board Rules and Regulations and Statements of
Procedure, Series 8, as amended, by direction of the
Acting Regional Director for Region 9, these
consolidated cases were transferred to the Board for
decision. Thereafter, the Employer filed a brief.
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.
On the entire record in this consolidated matter,
the Board finds:
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within
the meaning of the Act and it will effectuate the
purposes of the Act to assert jurisdiction herein.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to
represent certain 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. The Petitioner in Case 9-RC-10284, Local
Union 505, affiliated with the International Brother-
hood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen and
Helpers of America, hereinafter called Teamsters,
seeks to represent a unit of all quality control
inspectors, classifications A, B, and C, employed by
the Employer at its plant in Huntington, West
Virginia. The Petitioner in Case 9-RC-10326, United
Steelworkers of America, AFL-CIO--CLC, hereinaft-
er called Steelworkers, seeks to represent a unit of all
timekeepers and welding technicians, or specialists,
employed by the Employer at its Huntington plant.
The Employer contends that the units sought by both
Petitioners are inappropriate. The Employer further
contends that the inspectors, timekeepers, and
welding specialists, along with approximately 15
other unrepresented plant employees, mainly clerks,
constitute an accretion to the existing production
and maintenance unit represented by the Steelwork-
ers or, in the alternative, should be afforded a self-
determination election to ascertain whether they
wish to be included in the existing production and
maintenance unit or to remain unrepresented. In the
event that a residual unit of all of the unrepresented
plant employees is found appropriate, both the
Steelworkers and the Teamsters are willing to
represent the employees in such a unit.
Amcar Division, ACF Industries, Incorporated, is
engaged in the manufacture of various types of
railroad cars. The Steelworkers is the certified
collective-bargaining representative for a unit of
approximately 1,200 production and maintenance
employees at the Employer's plant in Huntington,
West Virginia. The original certification, as well as
the current collective-bargaining contract for the
Huntington unit, expressly excluded all salaried
employees. Because the inspectors, timekeepers,
welding specialists, expediters, schedulers, and vari-
ous classifications of plant clerks are all salaried,
they have never been included in the existing
production and maintenance unit and have never
been represented for purposes of collective bargain-
ing. It appears that the employees in the above-
named classifications are the only unrepresented
plant employees at the Huntington facility.
We find no merit in the Employer's contention that
the salaried employees in the foregoing job classifica-
tions constitute an accretion to the existing prod-
uction and maintenance unit. While it is not entirely
clear from the record whether these classifications
existed when Steelworkers was certified for the
production and maintenance unit, it is amply clear
that the contracting parties intended to exclude all
classifications of salaried employees from their
successive collective-bargaining agreements , includ-
ing their current contract. Accordingly, we find that
the unrepresented salaried plant employees do not
constitute an accretion to the existing production
and maintenance unit.'
There are approximately 29 quality control inspec-
tors at the Huntington plant who comprise the unit
sought by the Teamsters. These inspectors' work
stations are physically located in various production
departments throughout the plant. The inspectors are
responsible for discovering defects in materials
I The Horn & Hardart Company, 173 NLRB 1077.
210 NLRB No. 94
606 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
purchased from outside suppliers, parts fabricated in
the plant, and railroad cars at various stages of their
assembly. Once an inspector finds a defect in a car or
a part manufactured at the plant, he will either have
it corrected or note the problem on a ticket, which, in
the case of a defective car, travels with it for
correction at a later point. The inspectors themselves
do not make the corrections. If an inspector
discovers that the purchased material is defective, he
reports the problem to one of the Employer's buyers.
The inspectors are supervised by three inspector
supervisors who report to a chief inspector. The chief
inspector, in turn, reports to the quality assurance
manager, who is responsible to the plant manager.
Thus, while inspectors physically work near the unit
employees in the production departments, they are
separately supervised and do not perform production
work. Although the record establishes that there have
been permanent transfers of production and mainte-
nance employees into the inspector classifications, it
fails to establish the frequency of such transfers. The
record does not indicate whether any inspectors have
transferred into the production and maintenance
unit.
The timekeepers, who, along with the welding
specialists, comprise the unit sought by the Steel-
workers, are responsible for making appropriate
entries on employees' timecards with respect to
starting and finishing times for jobs. By doing so,
they maintain accurate production records to assure
correct payment for bargaining unit employees
represented by the Steelworkers. The timekeepers
work in offices, but spend anywhere from 2-1/2 to 4
hours each day in the production departments. The
timekeepers are separately supervised by a timekeep-
er supervisor, who reports to the head of the
Employer's accounting department. The latter, in
turn, reports to the plant manager. Thus, the
timekeepers, like the inspectors, spend a significant
portion of their working time physically located in
the production areas. Also like the inspectors, the
timekeepers are separately supervised and do not
perform production work.
The four welding specialists, whom Steelworkers
also seek to represent, help control welding proce-
dures, assist with technical difficulties concerning
welding, and conduct welding tests for job appli-
cants. They spend a substantial portion of their
working time in production areas. There is a separate
supervisor classification for the welding technicians,2
and they do not report to the general foreman of the
welding department but, through their own supervi-
sor, to the production manager.
In addition to the inspectors, timekeepers, and
welding technicians, there are other plant employee
classifications which, because of their salaried status,
have historically been excluded from the bargaining
unit. These classifications include the following:
scheduler-production, expediter-stores and stock
parts, expediter-production, clerk-technical, clerk-
material and inventory, and clerk-shipping.
The scheduler production determines when parts
manufactured in the plant will be required in the
subsequent assembly of cars and prepares a work
schedule for production foremen in order to assure
that parts will be ready when needed. The scheduler-
production is supervised, as are some unit employees,
by the foreman of the punch and shear department.
The five expediters-stores and stock parts are
responsible for seeing that the parts required for the
manufacture of the cars are available when needed in
the assembly process. Four of these expediters are
supervised by the inventory control supervisor, who
reports through the production and inventory control
supervisor to the production control planning and
scheduling manager. The fifth expediter-stores and
stock parts employee reports to the shipping depart-
ment supervisor, who in turn reports through the
material control supervisor to the manager of
production control planning and scheduling.
The three expediters production are responsible for
seeing that parts are manufactured on schedule, and
report lags in the production schedule either to the
scheduler-production or the production foreman
involved. They report to the heads of the blacksmith
shop and the punch and shear department, both of
which are within the production and maintenance
unit.
There is one clerk-technical assigned to the quality
assurance department and another assigned to the
superintendent of freight car erection and construc-
tion. The clerk-technical in the quality assurance
department is primarily responsible for maintaining
information concerning the fabrication of cars and
for furnishing this information to customers. The
clerk-technical assigned to the superintendent of
freight car erection and construction performs
clerical work involving records of vacations and
absenteeism, requisitions materials and parts needed
in production, and delivers messages to foremen and
unit employees when necessary. He spends approxi-
mately two-thirds of his working time in his office
and one-third of his time in the production area.
The clerk-material and inventory and the clerk-
shipping employees perform the various clerical
functions required in the inventory control and
shipping departments, respectively, and are super-
vised by the heads of those departments.
2 This position was vacant as of the date of the heanng
AMCAR DIVISION , ACF INDUSTRIES 607
The record establishes that the above scheduler,
expediters, and clerks spend at least part of their
working time in plant offices and that their duties
involve keeping records and performing other similar
work in connection with plant production. We
therefore find that the employees in these classifica-
tions are plant clerical employees.3
For the reasons discussed below, we find that the
units requested by the Petitioners are inappropriate
and that only a residual unit of all of the unrepre-
sented plant employees comprised of the various
classifications described and discussed above is
appropriate in the circumstances of this consolidated
matter.
As for the petitioned for units, the record fails to
establish that either the inspectors or the timekeepers
and welding technicians share a community of
interest separate and apart Lom that of the other
unrepresented plant employees. The record does
show that the inspectors are under the separate
immediate supervision of the quality assurance
manager. However, one of the clerk-technicals,
whom the Teamsters does not seek to represent, is
also under the quality assurance manager's supervi-
sion. With respect to the timekeepers and welding
technicians, the record establishes that these two
groups are each separately supervised and there is no
indication that there is any interchange or even daily
contact between them. Furthermore, if these units
are found appropriate there will still remain other
unrepresented plant employees. Under these circum-
stances, we find that a unit limited to the inspectors,
or to the timekeepers and welders, is inappropriate.4
All of the currently unrepresented plant employees
are salaried and receive the same holidays. There is
no history of collective bargaining for any of them.
While the currently unrepresented employees are in
almost daily contact with those in the unit, the
former are not engaged in direct production work,
there is no interchange between the two groups and,
with a few exceptions, the unrepresented employees
and the unit employees are not subject to the same
immediate supervision. Under these circumstances,
we find that all of the unrepresented employees
together may constitute an appropriate residual
unit.5
On the other hand, there is a substantial communi-
ty of interest between the unrepresented employees
3 Olin Mathieson Chemical Corporation, Forest Products Division, 117
NLRB 665
4 Olin Mathieson Chemical Corporation, supra
5 Rainbo Bread Company, 116 NLRB 1438, Olin Mathteson Chemical
Corporation, supra The record indicates that there is a position entitled
clerk-shop which is presently vacant and which the Employer indicated it
did not intend to fill It appears from the record that this is also a plant
clerical classification which we shall therefore include in the residual unit
and those in the unit. Both groups of employees are
paid time and a half for overtime, receive the same
shift differential, and enjoy the same holidays. In
addition, the unrepresented employees spend a
significant portion of their working time in the plant,
and their job functions are closely allied with, and
integral to, the production work performed by
members of the unit. Finally, the job classifications
at issue here are among those the Board has
traditionally included in production and mainte-
nance units.6 Therefore, we find that the employees
in the residual unit possess a sufficient community of
interest with the employees presently represented by
the Steelworkers to warrant their inclusion in the
broader unit if they so desire. Accordingly, we shall
direct an election in the residual unit.7
Based upon the foregoing and the entire record in
this case, we find that the following employees
constitute an appropriate residual unit:
All quality control inspectors, timekeepers, weld-
ing technicians, schedulers-production, expedi-
ters-stores and stock parts, expediters-production,
clerk-technical, clerk-material and inventory,
clerk-shop, and clerk-shipping employees, em-
ployed by the Employer at its plant in Hunting-
ton, West Virginia; excluding all other employees,
office clerical employees, guards, and supervisors
as defined in the Act.
If a majority of the employees in this unit vote for
Petitioner Teamsters, they will be taken to have
indicated their desire to constitute a separate unit,
and the Regional Director shall certify the Teamsters
as the exclusive representative therefor. If a majority
of the employees in this unit vote for Petitioner
Steelworkers, they will be taken to have indicated
their desire to be included in the existing production
and maintenance unit currently represented by the
Steelworkers and the Regional Director will issue a
certification to that effect. If the majority of the
employees in the unit cast their ballots for neither of
the above-named labor organizations, they will be
taken to have indicated their desire to remain
unrepresented and the Regional Director will issue a
Certification of Results of the Election.
[Direction of Election and Excelsior footnote
omitted from publication.]
6 See Olin Mathieson Chemical Corporation, supra.
7 The unit found appropriate contains employees not originally sought
by either Petitioner . Therefore, the sufficiency of the showing of interest
might not be clear. Accordingly, we direct the Regional Director not to
proceed with the election hereinafter directed until he shall first determine
that an adequate showing of interest in the unit of employees here found
appropriate has been made.