Plastics, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board DecisionsJun 10, 1975

218 N.L.R.B. 370 (N.L.R.B. 1975)

370 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD Plastics, Inc. and District No. 77, International Association ,of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, AFI-CIO, Petitioner. Case 18-RC-10300 June 10, 1975 DECISION AND CERTIFICATION OF RESULTS OF ELECTION BY MEMBERS FANNING, KENNEDY, AND PENELLO - Pursuant to a Stipulation for Certification Upon Consent Election, an election was held on December 12, 1974, under the direction and supervision of the Regional Director for Region 18 among employees in the appropriate unit. Of approximately 119 eligible voters, 117 cast ballots, of which 50 were for, and 67 against, the Petitioner. There were no challenged ballots. The Petitioner filed timely objections to the conduct of the election. Thereafter, the Regional Director conducted an investigation and on February 26, 1975, issued and duly served on the parties his report on objections in which he recommended that Objection 2 be sus- tained and that all other objections be overruled. Having found merit in Objection 2, the Regional Director recommended that the election be set aside and that a second election be directed. The Employer filed timely exceptions and a supporting 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. 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 purposes of the Act to assert jurisdiction herein. 2. The Petitioner, is a labor organization claiming to represent certain employees of the Employer. 3. A question affecting commerce exists concern- ing the representation of the employees of the Employer within the meaning of Sections 9(c)(1) and 2(6) and (7) of the Act. 4. The parties agree and we find that the following unit is appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining within the meaning of Section 9(b) of the Act: All production and maintenance employees, excluding office clerical employees, professional employees, guards and supervisors as defined in the Act, as amended. 5. The Board has considered the entire record in this case including the Regional Director 's report 1 No exceptions were filed to the Regional Director's recommendation 218 NLRB No. 60 and the exceptions and supporting brief. We find merit in the Employer's exceptions to the Regional Director's recommendation that Objection 2 be sustained.' The Employer operates facilities at three locations in Minnesota: Coon Rapids (the subject of the petition herein), St. Paul, and Faribault. The Peti- tioner currently represents the production and maintenance employees at the St. Paul facility. The Faribault facility is unorganized. Petitioner's, con- tract with the Employer at the St. Paul facility provides for the establishment of a pension plan to go into effect on March 1, 1976. By July 2, 1974, Employer had decided to implement the same plan at the Coon Rapids and Faribault facilities at the same time it went into effect at the St. Paul facility. However, according to Employer's manager, Joseph Kelleher, Employer had decided not to announce the pension plan until sometime in 1975 for business purposes. Also, the literature explaining the plan had not yet been printed. In late November an employee asked Foreman Becker in the presence of three to five other, employees, "What about this pension plan?" Becker, who had previously been office manager and as a result was aware of Employer's intentions with respect to the pension plan, informed the employees that the plan was to go into effect for all employees in 1976. This' was the first indication to' the employees that they would receive such coverage. Thereafter, on November 25, the Employer sent letters to the employees informing them that they would be covered by the pension plan. The Employer stated: Late last week, some employees on the second shift said that they had heard that the employees at Plastic's [sic ] St. Paul plant were due to be covered by a pension plan sometime in 1976, and these same employees asked their foreman if the employees at our plant would be covered by a pension plan. Over the weekend, I did some further checking and found out that although we never made a formal announcement about it, the fact of the matter is that this past summer, representatives of Plastics,- Inc. and our parent company, Anchor Hocking, did decide to have our plant's employees covered by the pension plan at the same time it goes into effect at the St. Paul plant-in March, 1976. I'm sorry that I didn't get this word to you sooner, but that's the true answer to the question. The Regional Director finds that it is clear that Employer had decided to implement the pension that Petitioner's other objections be overruled. PLASTICS, INC. plan for unit employees prior to the advent of the Petitioner. However, he finds that the acceleration of the announcement to November 26 was designed to interfere with the employees' choice of a collective- bargaining representative. The announcement of the pension coverage, was made in response to a legitimate employee inquiry. Employer concern about this coverage resulted from the inclusion of a pension plan in the contract negotiated between Petitioner and Employer at Employer's St. Paul plant. It would have been virtually impossible for Employer to respond to the inquiries without creating an erroneous impression. Thus, since they were aware of the plan to provide coverage at the St. Paul plant, the employees would have logically assumed from a failure to answer the question fully that Employer had not yet decided to provide such coverage at the Coon Rapids plant. Employer did not in any way condition pension coverage on rejection of the Unionâ€ž In fact, it must have been clear to the employees that the coverage resulted from Petitioner's negotiation of such a plan 371 at the St. Paul plant. In these circumstances we fmd that Employer's announcement of the plan did not interfere with the election but was simply a truthful response to a legitimate employee inquiry. Therefore, we shall overrule Petitioner's Objection 2. Accordingly, as we have overruled the objections and as the tally of the ballots shows that Petitioner has not received a majority of the valid votes cast, we shall certify the results of the election. CERTIFICATION OF RESULTS OF ELECTION It is hereby certified that a majority of the valid ballots have not been cast for District No. 77, International Association of Machinists and Aero- space Workers, AFL-CIO, and that said labor organization is not the exclusive representative of all the employees , in the unit herein involved , within the meaning of Section 9(a) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended.