St. Louis Public Service Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Sep 30, 1946

71 N.L.R.B. 160 (N.L.R.B. 1946)

In the Matter of ST. Louis PUBLIC SERVICE COMPANY and INTER-
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MACHINISTS, DISTRICT No. 9, LODGE 777
Case No. 14-R-1411.-Decided September 30, 1946
Mr. Gaylord C. Burke, of St. Louis, Mo., for the Employer.
Mr. W. C. Riley, of St. Louis, Mo., and Mr. Rudolph Faupl, of
Milwaukee, Wis., for the IAM.
Mr. O. David Zimring, by Mr. Hans J. Lehmann, of Chicago, Ill.,
and Mr. A. E. East, of St. Louis, Mo., for the Amalgamated.
Mr. Henry Weinreich, of St. Louis, Mo., for the Carpenters.
Mr. Bernard Dunau, of counsel to the Board.
DECISION
AND
ORDER
Upon a petition duly filed, hearing in this case was held at St. Louis,
Missouri, on June 26, 27, and 28, 1946, before Elmer L. Hunt, hearing
officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from
prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed. At the hearing, the hear-
ing officer referred to the Board the Amalgamated's motion to dismiss
the petition on the ground, inter alia, that the unit requested is in-
appropriate. For reasons hereinafter set forth, the motion is hereby
granted.
Upon the entire record in the case, the National Labor Relations
Board makes the following :
FINDINGS OF FACT
I. THE BUSINESS OF THE EMPLOYER
St. Louis Public Service Company, a Missouri corporation with
principal offices at St. Louis, Missouri, operates a city transit system
carrying passengers over fixed routes by motor bus and street car in
the city of St. Louis, Missouri, and in adjacent areas in St. Louis
County. It operates 763 street cars and 977 busses over 27 street car
lines and 31 bus lines, serving an area of 120 square miles. Passengers
employed by companies engaged in interstate commerce use the
employer's system in going to and from industrial areas. During the
71 N. L. R B ., No. 19.
160
ST. LOUIS PUBLIC SERVICE COMPANY 161
year 1945, the Employer's operating revenues were about $26,000,000.
During the same period, it purchased materials and supplies valued
at about $1,587,000, of which approximately 90 percent originated
outside the State of Missouri.
We find that the Employer is engaged in commerce within the
meaning of the National Labor Relations Act.
H. THE ORGANIZATIONS INVOLVED
International Association of Machinists, District No. 9, Lodge
777, herein called the IAM, is a labor organization claiming to repre-
sent employees of the Employer.
Amalgamated Association of Street, Electric Railway and Motor
Coach Employees of America, Divisions 788 and 1307, herein called the
Amalgamated, is a labor organization affiliated with the American
Federation of Labor claiming to represent employees of the Employer.
International Brotherhood of Carpenters & Joiners of America,
Local No. 1596, herein called the Carpenters, is a labor organization
affiliated with the American Federation of Labor, claiming to repre-
sent employees of the Employer.'
III. THE ALLEGED APPROPRIATE UNIT
The question presented in this case is the propriety of establishing
a unit limited to the skilled automotive mechanics employed in a city
transit system operating both street cars and motor busses, exclud-
ing from the unit the skilled rail mechanics and certain lesser skilled
maintenance employees. The IAM requests a unit composed of the
automotive mechanics 2 working in the Employer's automotive main
shop and automotive division shops, but desires to exclude therefrom
greasers, parts and chassis cleaners, gas and oil men, bus movers, boiler
attendants, cleaners, and the skilled rail mechanics 3 working in the
Employer's railway main shop and railway division shops. The Em-
ployer and the Amalgamated oppose this unit, contending that the re-
quested grouping is inappropriate on the grounds that the unit is
arbitrarily restricted and that a collective bargaining history on a
' After the close of the hearing, the Carpenters filed a motion with the Board stating
that it had no interest in the proceeding , and requesting , in effect, permission to withdraw
from further participation in the proceeding . Its motion is hereby granted.
2 The job titles represented among the automotive mechanics are machinists , engine
rebuilders , body overhaul repairmen , body accident repairmen , transmission unit repairmen,
differential unit repairmen , clutch unit repairmen , welders and metalizers , air unit repair-
men, fuel unit repairmen , radiator unit repairmen , unit disassemblers , brake unit repair-
men, chassis overhaul repairmen , day repairmen , and night repairmen
3 The job titles represented among the railway mechanics are welders , machinists, fare-
box repairmen , tinners, steel fabricators , machine shop bench hands , truck and motor shop
repairmen , armature room electrical repairmen , blacksmiths , carpenters , upholsterers,
painters, and car repairmen.
162 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
more comprehensive basis precludes its propriety. In addition, the
Employer contends that a currently existing collective agreement with
the Amalgamated is a bar to a present determination of representa-
tives. However, in view of our decision in this case, we find it unneces-
sary to consider either the bar question or the effect of the collective
bargaining history.
In the operation of its public transportation franchise, the Employer
employs about 4,400 workers. Of this number, about 70 percent are
operators, and the remainder are engaged in various phases of repair,
maintenance, clerical, and supervisory activities. Of this residual
group, 788 workers are employed in the equipment department.'
The equipment department is divided into a main shop and division
shops. The main shop is separated into Shop No. 1 and Shop No. 2.
Shop No. 2 is divided by a fire wall necessary for fire insurance pur-
poses. The area south of the wall is the automotive main shop. The
area north of the wall is part of the railway main shop, and comprises
the paint, upholstery, and trimming shops, inspection pits, and general
storeroom. Shop No. 1 comprises the remainder of the railway main
shop. The equipment department is concerned with the maintenance,
repair, replacement, inspection, and housing of vehicles.
The equipment department is under the over-all supervision of an
operating manager who has beneath him two general superintendents
who are responsible respectively for the automotive division and for
the railway division. In turn, the automotive general superintend-
ent has answerable to him a superintendent of bus garages and a
foreman of the automotive main shop. These individuals in turn
have various garage and shop foremen responsible to them. Similarly,
the railway general superintendent has answerable to him a superin-
tendent of street car stations and foremen in charge of car repairs,
electrical repairs, and machine and metal shop repairs. Each of these
individuals in turn has various car station and shop foremen respon-
sible to him. In addition, the automotive general superintendent
and the railway general superintendent are the joint supervisors of
the chief clerk, whose staff handles all equipment department clerical
matters, and an equipment engineer, whose engineering staff handles
all equipment department technical matters. In the event of the
absence of either of the general superintendents, the other will coor-
The number and relationship of employees in the equipment department are indicated
in the following table :
Total Supervisors Requested Requestedunit exclusion
Railway main shop ------------------------ 245 10 0 235
Railway division shops --------- ------------ 173 10 0 163
Automotive main shop--------------------- 112 4 102 6
Automotive division shops----------------- 258 17 122 119,
ST. LOUIS PUBLIC SERVICE COMPANY 163
dinate and direct the activities of the absent superintendent's working
force. A rail supervisor may direct automotive personnel, or an auto-
motive supervisor may direct rail personnel when, in the performance
of a particular job, convenience or efficiency will be served.
An important factor in the Employer's operational problems, indic-
ative of the relationship between automotive and rail maintenance, is
the joint utilization of street cars and motor busses. Beginning in
1923 when the Employer owned 1,590 street cars and no busses and
continuing to the present time when the Employer owns 977 busses and
763 street cars, there has been a steady decline in the use of street cars
and a corresponding increase in the use of motor busses, interrupted
during the war years but currently resumed, looking towards the
eventual elimination of all street cars except for a few runs. In
addition the body design and functioning of the new-type street car
has been deliberately modeled upon that of the motor bus to achieve
as far as possible a duplication of parts and a common maintenance
procedure. However, there is a basic distinction between the two
in that the bus is powered by an internal combustion engine and the
street car is powered by an electric motor.
To ease the problems of the transitional period and to effect present
economies from uniform maintenance procedure, the main shop of the
equipment department has been planned and operated as an integrated
unit. A good deal of necessary automotive maintenance work is per-
formed in the railway main shop by rail personnel. The painting, up-
holstery, trimming, welding, machine, and steel and tin shops, all sub-
divisions of the railway main shop, perform almost equal amounts of
bus and street car maintenance work. To a considerably lesser extent,
this is also true of the wood mill and the blacksmith shop. The farebox
shop, a part of the rail shop, repairs all fareboxes of both street cars
and motor busses. Often, welders, upholsterers, and painters, all rail
shop employees, will perform work in the automotive shop when it is
more convenient to send the man to the job than the job to the man.
The Employer's practice is to accept delivery of new busses in groups
of 100. Because of the abnormal work load which is thus put on the
automotive main shop, a part of the job of adjusting the new busses
to conform to the Employer's operational needs is performed in the
rail shop by rail personnel. As street cars are gradually eliminated,
more of the space in the rail shop will'be devoted to bus repair work.
The automotive main shop and the railway main shop have separate
storerooms, but each carries parts common to both busses and street
cars.5
'In addition , all the battery work is performed at a single bus garage. In the near
future, it is planned to combine a bus garage and a car station under a single roof and
under a single supervisor.
164 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
In addition to the functional interrelationships among the various
elements of the equipment department, and the occupational similari-
ties among equipment department workers, the area of common eco-
nomic concern of equipment department employees is coterminous with
the bounds of the department. The working conditions, the rates of
pay for comparable classifications, and the hours of work of employees
in the automotive main shop and the railway main shop, and in the
bus garages and car stations, are strikingly similar. Incentive bonuses,
vacation allowances, retirement plans, and free transportation privi-
leges are available to these employees on equivalent bases. Because of
the transition from street car to bus transportation, and the consequent
transfer of rail employees to bus divisions, the employees in the rail-
way main shop and the car stations have a strong interest in the condi-
tions of employment in the automotive main shop and the bus garages.
Employees are not dropped from employment as a result of transi-
tion; instead they are transferred to bus activities without loss of
seniority. Many of the top-grade mechanical jobs in the rail shop are
readily adaptable to like jobs in the automotive shop, and many of the
younger employees in the rail shop, in contemplation of the decrease
in street car transportation in the near future, are availing themselves
of veterans' educational benefits in order to train themselves for antici-
pated transfer to automotive work. When vacancies occur in certain
of the job classifications in the automotive shop, qualified employees
in the rail shop may bid for the vacancy. However, upon such volun-
tary transfer they acquire a new seniority date in order not to impair
the rights of earlier employees in that shop.
The work of the excluded group of greasers, chassis and parts clean-
ers, bus movers, gas and oil men, boiler attendants, and bus cleaners is
largely confined to the bus garages. The operators drive the busses into
the yards at the garages. Thereafter bus movers drive the vehicles
to and from points in and around the garage. They must be alert to
rcognize any irregularities in the operation of the busses. The busses
are run to the gassing island where gas and oil attendants check and
dispense water, gas, and oil, and keep a record of the gas and oil con-
sumed. The busses are then moved to the greasing pit where the greas-
er oils and greases the parts and makes a record of the materials used.
The greaser must be familiar with all moving parts of the vehicles.
The busses may be moved over the repair pit if the operators' reports
indicate that adjustments are needed or if periodic inspections are due.
Cleaners sweep, clean, and polish the busses, and generally keep the
premises in order. The chassis and parts cleaners clean the soiled
parts of units torn down by the mechanics, and clean underneath the
chassis of the busses. The lesser skilled maintenance employees work
in continuous association with the automotive mechanics, and in the
course of their work acquire a familiarity with the mechanical features
ST. LOUIS PUBLIC SERVICE COMPANY 165
of bus maintenance. They generally supplement this information
with trade school training. In normal times, these employees are hired
by the Employer when they are relatively young because of their me-
chanical aptitude, and the practice has been to use them as a pool in
which to train prospective mechanics. When they are qualified to per-
form the work, and a vacancy occurs, they are upgraded to the lowest
echelon of automotive mechanic in accordance with their seniority
which they carry with them into the mechanic's group. During the
war, because of the drastic displacement of personnel and the difficul-
ties of procuring adequate workers, there were insufficient qualified
personnel in the semi-skilled group to continue the practice of promo-
tion in accordance with seniority. At the present time, when any of
these helpers is promoted to a mechanic classification he relinquishes
his accumulated seniority and acquires a new seniority date. With
the resumption of normal operations, the automatic seniority upgrad-
ing will probably be resumed.
The IAM maintains that it seeks a "pure craft unit." A consider-
ation of the wide gamut of skills and specialties encompassed in the
term "automotive mechanic" indicates that the unit which the IAM
requests more nearly corresponds to a restricted departmental unit
than to a craft unit. It is also evident that rail and automotive manl-
tenance work is not performed in exclusive unrelated compartments,
and that equipment department workers, whether denoted rail or au-
tomotive employees by virtue of their place of employment, are not
thereby isolated from each other either occupationally or econom-
ically.e The skills of the rail mechanics are in many instances not
notably different from the skills of the automotive mechanics. Trans-
fers from the rail shop to the automotive shop on a voluntary basis are
not uncommon, and transfers of workers as a result of transition from
street car to bus transportation emphasize the strong bond of com-
mon interest among all workers in the equipment department. All
are confronted with identical wages, hours, and working conditions
problems. Moreover, the requested segregation of greasers, parts and
chassis cleaners, bus movers, gas and oil men, boiler attendants, and
cleaners from the automotive mechanics is particularly artificial and
impractical.7 These jobs are the semi-skilled level at which workers
break into the automotive maintenance field, and represent the train-
ing ground for ultimate upgrading into more skilled classifications.
Most important, the employment problems of the lesser skilled main-
tenance workers are not severable from those of the skilled mechanics."
G The IAM itself presently represents machinists in both the railway main shop and
the automotive main shop.
7 See Matter of Spokane United Railways, 60 N. L. R. B. 14.
8 For example, the greaser receives 75 cents per hour as distinguished from the Class
6 mechanic who receives 78 cents per hour, a wholly insubstantial difference. -
166 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
An analysis of the enmeshed relationships of all equipment depart-
ment workers impels the conclusion that the automotive mechanics
have no such special interests as would justify separating them from
t lie remaining employees in the equipment department of which they
are an inextricable part. We shall therefore dismiss the petition on
the ground of the inappropriateness of the requested unit.9
ORDER
Upon the basis of the above findings of fact, and the entire record
in the case, the National Labor Relations Board hereby orders that
the petition for an investigation and certification of representatives
of employees of St. Louis Public Service Company, St. Louis, Missouri,
filed by International Association of Machinists, District No. 9, Lodge
777, be, and it hereby is, dismissed.
9 Cf. Matter of Saks cE Company, 68 N. L. R. B. 413; Matter of Jacob Schmidt Brewing
Company, 57 N. L. R. B. 548; Matter of Triangle Publications , Inc., 40 N. L. R . B. 1330.