Gulf Oil Corp.

National Labor Relations Board - Board DecisionsApr 6, 1954

108 N.L.R.B. 162 (N.L.R.B. 1954)

162 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD GULF OIL CORPORATION and LODGE 823 OF DISTRICT 31, INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MACHINISTS, AFL, Petitioner. Case No. 39-RC-660 . April 6, 1954 DECISION AND ORDER Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor Relations Act, a hearing was held before C. L. Stephens, hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed. Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds: 1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the mean- ing of the Act. 2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent certain employees of the Employer. 3. No question affecting commerce exists concerning the representation of employees of the Employer with the mean- ing of Section 9 (c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act, for the following reasons: The Petitioner seeks to sever a group of garage mechanics from a production and maintenance unit. Oil Workers Inter- national Union, CIO, herein called the Intervenor, which has represented production and maintenance employees since 1943, opposes severance, and the Employer assumes a neutral position. The unit sought by the Petitioner includes first- and second- class garage mechanics, scooter repairmen, garage mechanic apprentices, trainees, and helpers. These employees are part of the Employer's garage department, which has many other classifications in it, and are engaged generally in the main- tenance of automotive equipment and other types of engines used in the refinery. The record in this case does not delineate the precise duties of the garage mechanics. The record in an earlier case 1 describes their duties as follows: The garage mechanics 2 maintain trucks, gasoline locomotives, combustion engines, powered caterpillar cranes, powered electric welders, air compressors, small draining pumps, a heavy-duty pumping engine, a fire pumper, electrical units on seagoing vessels, and unloading engines on barges. Among the equipment they use are metal-turning lathes, bushing grinders, boring bars, valve facers, and valve reseaters. They work to close tol- erances, from 0.5 to 0.006 inch. In 1951 the Employer instituted 4-year apprenticeship and on-the-job training programs for first-class garage mechanics. Eleven of the approximately twenty-four employees in the 177 NLRB 308; 79 NLRB 1274 (supplemental decision on motion for reconsideration). 2 The earlier record does not specify garage mechanic first or second class in describing "garage mechanic" duties. 108 NLRB No. 31. GULF OIL CORPORATION 163 Petitioner ' s proposed unit are now classified as first-class garage mechanics. In order to become a first -class mechanic since the institu- tion of the apprenticeship and on-the- job training program, 3 an employee need not be a second -class mechanic . The record shows that participation in these programs is open to all employees in the garage mechanic group and to all classifica- tions in the entire garage department , including many employees not included in the unit the Petitioner seeks to sever here. Although second -class garage mechanics are preferred over some other classifications for admission to the apprenticeship program, equal preference is given to the classification of payloader operator, which is not included in the proposed unit. It thus appears that second- class garage mechanics are not automatically advanced to first-class mechanics , but are on virtually the same footing as other nonjourneymen in the garage department.4 On the basis of the above-related facts and of the entire record , including the record in the earlier case, we are not persuaded that the employees sought by the Petitioner constitute a distinct and homogeneous group of skilled journey- man craftsmen . The Board has consistently held that garage mechanics are not craftsmen .5 And in the recent American Potash case,6 the Board said ". . . we wish to make it clear that the requirement that the unit sought to be severed must be a true craft group will be rigidly enforced in cases where severance is sought on that basis . We propose to exercise great care in making certain that in the administration of this rule only group exercising genuine craft skills will be em- braced within the ambit of the rule, and that the requirements will not be relaxed over a period of time." Accordingly, we find that the unit sought by the Petitioner is inappropriate for severance purposes . We shall, therefore, dismiss the petition herein. [The Board dismissed the petition.] 3The two programs are each designed to lead ultimately to a first -class mechanic classifi- cation , and a participant in either program follows the same procedure . The only apparent difference between the two is that the Employer selects apprentices and the employees "bid in" for the on- the-job training program. 4The Employer testified that "Theoretically , we hope to train all our mechanics, but the training program is too young . They can go from number two classification, if qualified, to the number one." Apparently the new ( 1951) program is no yet so fully implemented as to preclude promotion from within. 5E. g., Key System Transit Lines , 105 NLRB 526 ; C. K. Williams & Co., 106 NLRB 219; Gulf Oil Corporation , 79 NLRB 1274. 6American Potash & Chemical Corporation, 107 NLRB 1418, at 7.