Pacific International Rice Mills, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Apr 2, 1976

223 N.L.R.B. 613 (N.L.R.B. 1976)

PACIFIC INTERNATIONAL RICE MILLS 613
Pacific International Rice Mills, Inc. and Chauffeurs,
Teamsters and Helpers Local Union No. 150, Inter-
national Brotherhood of Teamsters , Chauffeurs,
Warehousemen and Helpers of America , Petitioner.
Case 20-RC-12582
April 2, 1976
DECISION AND CERTIFICATION OF
REPRESENTATIVE
BY CHAIRMAN MURPHY AND MEMBERS JENKINS
AND WALTHER
Pursuant to authority granted it by the National
Labor Relations Board under Section 3(b) of the Na-
tional Labor Relations Act, as amended, a three-
member panel has considered objections to an elec-
tion held on April 25, 1975,' and the Hearing
Officer's report recommending disposition of same.
The Board has reviewed the record in light of
Respondent's exceptions 2 and brief in support there-
1 The election was conducted pursuant to a Stipulation for Certification
Upon Consent Election . The tally was: 25 for, and 21 against, the Petitioner.
There were six challenged ballots. The Hearing Officer recommended that
the Employer's four challenges be affirmed . No exceptions were filed to that
recommendation . Accordingly , it is hereby adopted . Petitioner withdrew its
two challenges at the hearing. Its challenges are hereby overruled. As a
consequence of.the above rulings, the challenged ballots are no longer deter-
minative of the results of the election.
2 In a supplement to its brief , the Employer argues that the Hearing
Officer's alleged membership in an NLRB employee association prevented
him from being impartial . Executive Order 11491, as amended , gives to each
Federal employee the right to form , join, and assist labor organizations. We
find nothing in the Hearing Officer's alleged membership which might pre-
vent him from being impartial . Were we to base our assignment of work on
our employees ' membership or nonmembership in an employee collective-
bargaining association , we would find ourselves in the same unhappy pre-
dicament as other employers find themselves when they affect their employ-
ees' working conditions or tenure on the basis of their membership or non-
membership in unions . This we will not do . To the extent that the Employer
is of the view that a Board Hearing Officer , or any other employee , cannot
be impartial simply because he or she belongs to an employee collective-
of, and hereby adopts the Hearing Officer's findings'
and recommendations.
CERTIFICATION OF REPRESENTATIVE
It is hereby certified that a majority of the valid
ballots have been cast for Chauffeurs, Teamsters,
and Helpers Local Union No. 150, International
Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehouse-
men and Helpers of America, and that, pursuant to
Section 9(a) of the National Labor Relations Act, as
amended, said labor organization is the exclusive
representative of all the employees in the following
appropriate unit for the purposes of collective bar-
gaining in respect to rates of pay, wages, hours of
employment, or other conditions of employment:
All production, warehouse, maintenance, and
general labor employees, truckdrivers, and fork-
lift operators employed by Pacific International
Rice Mills, Inc., at Kentucky Avenue and High-
way 113, Woodland, California, excluding office
clericals,, guards, and supervisors as defined by
the Act.
bargaining association representing Agency employees, or performs man-
agement or supervisory duties for the Agency, a position with which we
fully disagree and which is wholly unsupported, the Employer should ad-
dress its contention to the President of the United States or to the Congress.
It should be noted , however, that in order to avoid even the possible appear-
ance of bias or prejudice on the part of Board personnel, sec. 3 (d) of Execu-
tive Order 11491 provides:
Employees engaged in administering a labor-management relations
law . . . shall not be represented by a labor organization which also
represents other groups of employees under the law . . . or which is
affiliated directly or indirectly with an organization which represents
such group of employees.
Furthermore , we have read the record closely and find no evidence of preju-
dice or bias on the Hearing Officer's part.
3 The Employer has excepted to certain credibility resolutions of the
Hearing Officer . It is the established policy of the Board not to overrule a
Hearing Officer's credibility resolutions unless the clear preponderance of
all the relevant evidence convinces us that the resolutions are incorrect. The
Coca-Cola Bottling Company of Memphis, 132 NLRB 481, 483 (1961):
Stretch-Tex Co., 118 NLRB 1359, 1361 (1957). We find no sufficient basis
for disturbing the credibility resolutions in this case.
223 NT RR No. 88