Lansing General Hospital

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Aug 27, 1975

220 N.L.R.B. 1 (N.L.R.B. 1975)

LANSING GENERAL HOSPITAL I
Lansing General Hospital and Service Employees In-
ternational Union, AFL-CIO, Petitioner. Case 7-
RC-12887
August 27, 1975
DECISION AND ORDER
BY CHAIRMAN MURPHY AND MEMBERS FANNING
AND PENELLO
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9(c) of
the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, a
hearing was held before Hearing Officer Kenneth D.
Meadows. Following the hearing and pursuant to
Section 102.67 of the National Labor Relations
Board Rules and Regulations and Statements of Pro-
cedure, Series 8 , as amended, and by direction of the
Regional Director for Region 7, this case was trans-
ferred to the National Labor Relations Board for de-
cision . Briefs have been timely filed by the Employer
and Petitioner.
Pursuant to Section 3(b) of the National Labor
Relations Act, 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 rul-
ings 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:
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within
the meaning of the Act and it will effectuate the pur-
poses of the Act to assert jurisdiction herein.
2. The labor organization involved claims to rep-
resent certain employees of the Employer.
3. No question affecting commerce exists concern-
ing the representation of certain employees of the
Employer within the meaning of Section 2(6) and (7)
of the Act, for the following reasons:
The Petitioner requests an election in a unit of jan-
itors, janitresses, leaders, and wall washers employed
by the Employer in the housekeeping department at
its Lansing, Michigan, hospital. The Employer ar-
gues for the dismissal of the petition on the grounds
that the classifications requested by Petitioner are
covered by a contract effective from December 17,
1972, to December 17, 1975, between it and Council
55, American Federation of State, County and Mu-
nicipal Employees, AFL-CIO (herein AFSCME),
which had been certified by the Michigan Employ-
ment Relations Commission (herein MERC) on
March 7, 1972, as the exclusive bargaining represen-
tative for a unit of the Employer's service and main-
tenance employees.'
However, prior to 1974, the Employer's practice
was to contract out its janitorial and other house-
keeping work to various janitorial contractors rather
than to perform such work with its own employees.
From the mid 1960's until 1971, the janitorial work at
the Employer's hospital was performed by Allied
Maintenance Company (herein Allied). In 1971,
Master Housekeepers, Inc. (herein Master), succeed-
ed to Allied's contract with the Employer and hired
Allied's employees. During the entire period when
Allied and Master were providing janitorial services
to the Employer, their employees were represented
by Petitioner and were covered by consecutive col-
lective-bargaining agreements executed on their be-
half by Petitioner with Allied and Master, respective-
ly. On March 15, 1974, the Employer, in an effort to
reduce costs, served formal notice on Master that it
would be terminating the janitorial service contract
as of July 1, 1974, and establishing its own house-
keeping department. The contract with Master was
terminated as of July 1, and the Employer retained
the former employees and supervisors of Master as
its own employees to perform its janitorial and
housekeeping work. Since that time, however, the
Employer has refused to recognize Petitioner as the
exclusive representative of the employees in its newly
created housekeeping department and has refused to
apply the Petitioner-Master collective-bargaining
agreement to them. Instead, the Employer has
viewed the housekeeping unit as an accretion to the
preexisting service and maintenance unit represented
by AFSCME, and has, since July 1, applied its col-
lective-bargaining agreement with AFSCME to the
housekeeping employees?
While the housekeeping employees now receive the
same contractual benefits as do the other service and
maintenance employees, AFSCME has not sought to
represent them actively. Counsel for AFSCME ap-
peared specially at the hearing to disclaim interest in
the representation of the housekeeping employees,
after which he withdrew from the proceeding. The
apparent motivation behind this disclaimer was an
AFL-CIO "no-raid" proceeding initiated by Peti-
tioner against AFSCME in January 1975, 2 months
prior to the hearing, in which the arbitrator had
The unit was described as follows-
All regular full time and part time nurse aides, orderlies , ward clerks,
dietary and kitchen employees , central supply room employees, store
room clerks, linen room clerks, linen aides, unregistered technicians,
maintenance equipment and grounds employees . excluding registered
nurses, licensed practical nurses, all clerical employees , registered tech-
nicians, pharmacists , day care center attendants, co-op students, securi-
ty guards and supervisors, and all other employees.
a While the houskeeping employees no longer enjoy the benefits provided
for in the old Petitioner-Master contract , the Employer has allowed them to
retain their old seniority.
220 NLRB No. 1
2 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
found the housekeeping employees properly within
Petitioner's jurisdiction. In a collateral MERC pro-
ceeding in which the appropriateness of the house-
keeping unit was litigated,' AFSCME's counsel stat-
ed that the existence of the interunion "no-raid"
agreement was "one of the considerations" for its
failure to seek representation of the housekeeping
employees; but it would be willing to represent them
if MERC found that they had accreted to its preex-
isting service and maintenance unit.
Prior to July 1974, the service and maintenance
employees of the Employer were divided into the fol-
lowing administrative departments: (1) dietary, (2)
maintenance, (3) central supply, (4) pharmacy, (5)
cardiopulmonary (unregistered technicians), (6) pa-
thology (unregistered technicians), (7) X-ray (unre-
gistered technicians), and (8) nursing (nurses aides,
orderlies, and ward clerks). After the Employer as-
sumed responsibility for furnishing housekeeping
services on July 1, 1974, a new housekeeping depart-
ment was created, staffed by the former employees of
Master. The immediate supervisor of the housekeep-
ing department, Klotz, who is now executive house-
keeper, was formerly a housekeeping supervisor em-
ployed by Master. Klotz, along with the head of the
maintenance department, is immediately answerable
to Warfield, the director of the physical plant. At
present, all departments except nursing are ultimate-
ly responsible to Assistant Hospital Administrator
Amos.4
The scope of duties assigned housekeeping person-
nel has been expanded since the housekeeping func-
tions was taken over by the Employer.' Housekeep-
ing aides, when employed by Master, had the
responsibility of general cleaning of patients' rooms
and bathrooms, including mopping and emptying of
trash cans. After July 1, 1974, they were given the
added tasks of washing windows, television sets, and
cabinets in the individual patient rooms, and the
carting of linen through the hospital, the latter task
previously performed by other service and mainte-
nance employees. Other housekeeping employees
have been given additional assignments previously or
presently performed by other employees within the
preexisting service and maintenance unit, such as
7 Petitioner had, on July 5, 1974, filed an unfair labor practice charge with
MERC, alleging that the Employer had refused to bargain with Petitioner
upon canceling the Master contract and taking over the housekeeping func-
tions. The MERC administrative law judge eventually dismissed the charge,
finding that the housekeeping unit was no longer appropnate , but rather
was an accretion to the overall hospital service and maintenance unit On
January 8 , 1975, MERC affirmed its administrative law judge.
The nursing department employees are answerable to the director of
nursing who in turn reports to the hospital administrator.
3 The record shows that the housekeeping department consists of 28 to 30
employees while the preexisting service and maintenance unit has approxi-
mately 250 employees.
light bulb cleaning, yard work, tile scraping, and fur-
niture moving.
Housekeeping employees come into daily contact
with other service and maintenance employees. All
service and maintenance employees, including
housekeeping employees, use the same punch-in sys-
tem, are required to take the same physical examina-
tion prior to being hired, participate in the same per-
sonnel orientation program, and are subject to the
same hospital rules and regulations.
The issue is whether the housekeeping employees
previously employed by Master have, as a result of
the Employer's assumption of housekeeping work
previously performed by Master, accreted to the
Employer's preexisting unit of service and mainte-
nance employees, thus making the contract between
the Employer and AFSCME a bar to the instant peti-
tion.
At the outset, we note that this issue has already
been litigated in a collateral state proceeding wherein
MERC found that the housekeeping employees had
accreted to the existing service and maintenance
unit.
Here the result reached by MERC is totally consis-
tent with the Board law, and a finding of accretion is
amply supported by the record evidence in this case.
These employees have been thoroughly integrated
into the general service and maintenance operations
of the Employer's hospital. They share common su-
pervision with the maintenance employees. Many of
the housekeeping employees have taken on tasks pre-
viously performed by personnel within the service
and maintenance unit. Indeed, as noted above, there
have been instances in which a housekeeping em-
ployee engages in job functions usually reserved to,
and presently performed by, maintenance personnel
such as grounds work and tile scraping. The nature
of the duties of the housekeeping employees brings
them in constant contact with other service and
maintenance employees on a daily basis. The Em-
ployer applies identical personnel policies towards
housekeeping employees and other service and main-
tenance employees. Finally, the housekeeping em-
ployees do not possess any unique skills or special-
ized training which would justify their exclusion from
an overall service and maintenance unit. In fact,
housekeeping personnel are precisely the type of un-
skilled employees which we have regarded as proper-
ly included in an overall service and maintenance
unit within a hospital. See, e .g., Mercy Hospitals of
Sacramento, Inc., 217 NLRB No. 131 (1975); Nathan
and Miriam Barnert Memorial Hospital Association
d/b/a Barnert Memorial Hospital Center, 217 NLRB
No. 132 (1975).
Petitioner adverts to its almost decade-long history
LANSING GENERAL HOSPITAL
of representation of the housekeeping employees,
marked as it is by a harmonious bargaining relation-
ship with the independent housekeeping contractors
Allied and Master. However, whatever unique com-
munity of interest these employees might have
shared when employed by such independent contrac-
tors, such community, after the assumption of the
housekeeping contractors' duties by the Employer
and its retention of their employees, has been sub-
merged into a broader community of interest they
now share with the Employer's service and mainte-
nance employees .6 In light of the foregoing, we find
that the housekeeping employees recently acquired
6 Firestone Synthetic Fibers Company, 171 NLRB 1121 ( 1968).
3
by the Employer were normal accretions to the ex-
isting service and maintenance unit, and were prop-
erly treated as such by the Employer. We conclude
that the 1972 contract between the Employer and
AFSCME is a bar to this proceeding and shall, there-
fore, dismiss the petition?
ORDER
It is hereby ordered that the petition filed herein
be, and it is hereby is, dismissed.
7 We find no merit in Petitioner's argument that the Employer is a succes-
sor to Master and therefore has a duty pursuant to the Supreme Court's
decision in N L R B v. Burns International Security Service, Inc., 406 U.S.
272 (1972), to bargain with Petitioner concerning the housekeeping employ-
ees. We do not regard the Burns doctrine as applicable where, as here, the
predecessor's bargaining unit did not remain intact