Battelle, Pacific Northwest National Laboratories

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Feb 18, 2016

363 NLRB No. 119 (N.L.R.B. 2016)

363 NLRB No. 119
NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the
bound volumes of NLRB decisions. Readers are requested to notify the Ex-
ecutive Secretary, National Labor Relations Board, Washington, D.C.
20570, of any typographical or other formal errors so that corrections can
be included in the bound volumes.
Battelle Memorial Institute and Pacific Northwest
Regional Council of Carpenters Local 2403, Pe-
titioner and Hanford Atomic Metal Trades
Council, Intervenor. Case 19–RC–135888
February 18, 2016
ORDER DENYING REVIEW
BY CHAIRMAN PEARCE AND MEMBERS MISCIMARRA
AND MCFERRAN
The Petitioner seeks to represent a unit of carpenters
and millwrights employed by the Employer at its Pacific
Northwest National Laboratory facility, and historically
represented by the Intervenor in a multicraft unit. The
Regional Director evaluated the petition under the analyt-
ical framework in Mallinckrodt Chemical Works, 162
NLRB 387 (1966), and dismissed the petition. (The Re-
gional Director’s Decision and Order is attached as an
appendix.) The Petitioner filed a request for review.
The National Labor Relations Board has delegated its
authority in this proceeding to a three-member panel.
Having carefully considered the Petitioner’s Request for
Review of the Regional Director’s Decision and Order
we find that it presents no compelling reasons to recon-
sider well-established policies under Mallinckrodt. Nor
has the Petitioner established that the Regional Director’s
decision raises a substantial question of law or policy
because it departs from officially reported Board prece-
dent, or that the decision contains clear, substantial fac-
tual errors prejudicial to the Petitioner.1 Accordingly, the
Request for Review is denied as it raises no substantial
issues warranting review.
Our dissenting colleague would grant review in part
because the Board recently affirmed a Regional Direc-
tor’s decision granting a petition for a severance election
in Electric Boat Corp., Case 01–RC–124746 (2015) (not
reported in Board volumes).2 Contrary to our colleague,
Electric Boat is distinguishable and does not control the
issue presented here. Rather, the differing conclusions in
these two cases stem from the consistent application of

1 See Board’s Rules and Regulations, Sec. 102.67(c).
2 The Regional Director here considered and distinguished the Re-
gional Director’s decision in Electric Boat. The Petitioner filed its
Request for Review in this case while Electric Boat was pending before
the Board on review. A party in Electric Boat requested that the Board
consider, and the Board did consider, the Regional Director’s decision
in this case as part of its review of the Regional Director’s decision in
Electric Boat.
established Board law to significantly different factual
situations.
In evaluating a petition seeking to sever a craft or de-
partmental unit from a previously represented larger unit,
the Board balances the special interest of the petitioned-
for employees in seeking separate representation with the
“interest of the employer and the total employee com-
plement in maintaining the industrial stability and result-
ing benefits of an historical” unit, and “the public interest
and the interests of the employer and the [incumbent]
union in maintaining overall plant stability in labor rela-
tions and uninterrupted operation of integrated . . . facili-
ties.” Mallinckrodt, above at 392; accord: Metropolitan
Opera Assn., Inc., 327 NLRB 740, 752 (1999). In as-
sessing these competing interests, the Board weighs all
relevant factors on a case-by-case basis, and applies the
same principles and standards to all industries.
Mallinckrodt, above at 398. Relevant factors include,
but are not limited to, factors that would also be relevant
to the distinct question of whether employees in the peti-
tioned-for-unit would constitute an appropriate craft unit
as an initial matter under, e.g., Burns & Roe Services
Corp., 313 NLRB 1307, 1308 (1994), and MGM Mirage
d/b/a The Mirage Casino-Hotel, 338 NLRB 529 (2002)
(relied upon by our dissenting colleague).
We agree with our colleague’s general proposition that
it is sometimes appropriate to include separate-but-
related craft employees in a single unit where the ques-
tion before us is the composition of an appropriate unit
within a previously-unrepresented workforce. See Mi-
rage Casino-Hotel, above at 529 (finding appropriate
combined unit of carpenters and upholsterers as an initial
unit determination). But where, as here, the question is
whether a group of employees may be severed from an
existing collective-bargaining unit, the petitioner faces a
higher bar because, as stated above, the interest of the
employees in the petitioned-for unit in having an oppor-
tunity to vote for separate representation must be bal-
anced against a number of other interests, including the
interest of employees excluded from the petitioned-for-
unit in maintaining the bargaining strength inherent in
the historic unfractured larger unit. See Kaiser Founda-
tion Hospital, 312 NLRB 933, 936 & fn. 21 (1993)
(Mallinckrodt places a “heavy burden” on the party seek-
ing severance: “the Board is reluctant, absent compel-
ling circumstances, to disturb bargaining units estab-
lished by mutual consent where there has been a long
history of continuous bargaining”).
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD2
Here, the Regional Director applied the Mallinckrodt
factors to determine that severance was not warranted.3
The Regional Director found (and it is undisputed) that
the Intervenor is—and has been for decades4—the exclu-
sive collective-bargaining representative of the Employ-
er’s employees in the existing overall unit.5 The Region-
al Director further found that: (1) the petitioned-for em-
ployees do not constitute a homogeneous group because
carpenters in the petitioned-for unit perform work that is
distinct from, and does not overlap with, the work per-
formed by the millwrights in the petitioned-for unit;6 (2)

3 Under Mallinckrodt, relevant factors include: (1) collective-
bargaining history; (2) whether the petitioned for unit consists of a
distinct and homogeneous group; (3) the extent the petitioned-for em-
ployees have maintained a separate identity within the overall unit; (4)
the degree of integration of the production process; (5) the qualifica-
tions of the union seeking severance; and (6) the pattern of collective
bargaining in the industry.
4 We do not find that the Petitioner has been prejudicially affected
by any error the Regional Director may have made regarding the pre-
cise number of decades that the Intervenor has been the exclusive col-
lective-bargaining representative.
5 Because the Intervenor, not the Petitioner, has been the historic ex-
clusive collective-bargaining representative of the Employer’s employ-
ees, including those in the petitioned-for-unit, dismissing the petition
here does not, contrary to our dissenting colleague, “requir[e] employ-
ees to leave their existing union and be represented . . . by different
unions.” Our colleague objects that the Petitioner “performed the es-
sential function of representing [the carpenters and millwrights] in
Appendix A negotiations, in grievance-arbitration matters, and in all
other day-to-day labor relations matters.” But our colleague fails to
acknowledge, as the Regional Director found, that the Intervenor has
always played a role in negotiating the various Appendix A
subagreements and has exercised final authority over their approval.
And, through a grievance committee, the Intervenor has controlled the
advancement of grievances that could not be resolved informally by
local stewards on the shop floor at the first stage of the grievance-
arbitration procedure. These aspects of the Intervenor’s representation
of all of the unit employees have not changed. Nor, again contrary to
our colleague, does our application of established doctrine in this case
depart from precedent. As the Regional Director recognized, the Board
has previously dismissed petitions filed by labor organizations that
have represented subgroups within an overall unit represented by a
single, different, exclusive collective-bargaining representative. In
Metropolitan Opera Assn., above, for example, the Board dismissed a
severance petition where the petitioner had historically represented a
subgroup of choristers within an overall unit represented by the Musical
Artists. And, in Houdaille Industries, Inc., Houdaille-Duval-Wright
Co. Division, 183 NLRB 678, 679 (1970), the Board dismissed a peti-
tion by an Operating Engineers local that had represented a subgroup of
employees by agreement with the certified exclusive collective-
bargaining representative of the overall unit, effectively requiring a
group of heavy equipment operators and oilers who had previously
been represented by Operating Engineers to be represented by Team-
sters. Finally, we note that the Petitioner has identified no factual basis
in the record, either to the Regional Director or in its Request for Re-
view, to substantiate its speculative concerns—shared by our dissenting
colleague—that the Intervenor will fail adequately to represent the
interests of the employees in the petitioned-for unit in the future.
6 By contrast, the record in Electric Boat established that virtually all
of the employees in the petitioned-for unit there—whether designated
the carpenters and millwrights in the petitioned-for-unit
do not have a separate identity since they are not admin-
istratively organized and supervised separately from oth-
er employees in the existing unit;7 and (3) the carpenters
and millwrights normally work as members of integrated
teams composed of employees from multiple crafts who
work together to complete specific assigned tasks.8 The
Petitioner’s Request for Review does not persuade us
that the Regional Director clearly and prejudicially erred
in making these or any other substantial factual findings.
Nor does the Request for Review compel us to reconsid-
er the well-established policies underlying our analysis in
this area. We conclude that the Petitioner has not pre-
sented compelling reasons to grant its Request for Re-
view, which is, accordingly, denied.
Dated, Washington, D.C. February 18, 2016
______________________________________
Mark Gaston Pearce, Chairman
______________________________________
Lauren McFerran, Member
(SEAL) NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
MEMBER MISCIMARRA, dissenting.
This case involves an unusual situation that has several
moving parts. It centers on a multiple-union entity, the
Hanford Atomic Metal Trades Council (Council), which
negotiates a site-wide collective-bargaining agreement
(the CBA) at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
(the Laboratory). The Laboratory is operated by a con-
tractor, Battelle Memorial Institute (Battelle). The
sitewide CBA is entered into between Battelle and the
Council, and it covers all represented craft and trade un-
ion positions at the Laboratory. Various local unions—
each affiliated with the Council—provide day-to-day
representation of employees within different trades or
crafts; and the subsidiary local unions typically negotiate
separate agreements specifying the wages, benefits, and

“carpenter,” “joiner,” “joiner-upholsterer,” or “carpenter-diver”—were
trained to perform the two jobs that comprised the majority of the car-
penters’ work: constructing scaffolding and installing anechoic exteri-
or-hull coating on the employer’s submarines.
7 By contrast, approximately 95 percent of the petitioned-for carpen-
ters in Electric Boat were administratively organized in a single sepa-
rate department with common supervision.
8 By contrast, employees in the petitioned-for-unit in Electric Boat
performed their discrete work separately from, albeit in close proximity
to, other employees.
BATTELLE MEMORIAL INSTITUTE 3
jurisdictional rules pertaining to the employees who per-
form work within the jurisdiction of each subsidiary local
union. (For ease of reference, I use the term “subsidiary
local union” to describe each Council-affiliated local
union, and “subsidiary agreement” to describe an agree-
ment negotiated by a subsidiary local union.) Each sub-
sidiary agreement is listed in “Appendix A” to the
sitewide CBA, which makes each subsidiary agreement
part of the sitewide CBA. For many years, the sitewide
CBA has covered carpenters and millwrights; Pacific
Northwest Regional Council of Carpenters Local 2403
(Carpenters Local 2403) has been their subsidiary local
union and has negotiated the applicable subsidiary
agreement covering them.
This is where things get even more complicated. The
Council is affiliated with the AFL–CIO Metal Trades
Department (AFL–CIO or Metal Trades Department).
Carpenters Local 2403 is affiliated with its parent union,
the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners (Car-
penters International). In 2001, the Carpenters Interna-
tional withdrew from the AFL–CIO. For a number of
years, this withdrawal did not affect the representation of
carpenters and millwrights at the Laboratory, whose sub-
sidiary local union continued to be Carpenters Local
2403. However, in 2014, three events occurred: (i) the
Council—based on the withdrawal of the Carpenters
International from the AFL–CIO—expelled Carpenters
Local 2403 from the Council; (ii) the Council advised the
Laboratory’s carpenters that, instead of being represented
by Carpenters Local 2403, their subsidiary local union
would become a local union affiliated with the Sheet
Metal Workers; and (iii) the Council similarly advised
the Laboratory’s millwrights that they would no longer
be represented by Carpenters Local 2403 and their sub-
sidiary local union would become a local union affiliated
with the International Association of Machinists. At the
Laboratory, the carpenters and millwrights have not al-
ways had a smooth relationship with the Sheet Metal
Workers and the Machinists. To the contrary, Carpenters
Local 2403 had many serious jurisdictional disputes with
the Sheet Metal Workers and the Machinists regarding
work performed by carpenters and millwrights. Obvi-
ously, the Sheet Metal Workers and the Machinists local
unions cannot be faulted for representing the interests of
their respective members in any jurisdictional disputes
with the carpenters and millwrights. Nonetheless, the
events described above have required carpenters and
millwrights to accept representation by subsidiary local
unions that have opposed their jurisdictional interests in
the past.
This brings us to the representation petition filed in the
instant case by Carpenters Local 2403, which seeks, un-
surprisingly, to have a representation election conducted
in a bargaining unit consisting of the carpenters and
millwrights—the very employees that Carpenters Local
2403 previously represented as their subsidiary local
union. The Regional Director dismissed the petition.
Pursuant to Section 102.67(c) of the Board’s Rules and
Regulations, Carpenters Local 2403 requests Board re-
view of the Regional Director’s decision. My colleagues
deny the Request for Review. I would grant review, for
three reasons.
First, the Regional Director’s dismissal of this case is
contrary to prior decisions by a Regional Director and
the Board in Electric Boat Corp., Case 01–RC–124746
(granting review August 14, 2014, and affirming the Re-
gional Director’s decision April 30, 2015) (hereinafter
Electric Boat).
Second, the Regional Director’s factual findings are
based on a lengthy, complex, and extremely detailed rec-
ord, and the pending Request for Review raises substan-
tial questions as to whether they are clearly erroneous.
Third, this case presents a substantial question of pub-
lic policy, which is whether the Board should dismiss a
petition filed by a local union that was the petitioned-for
employees’ bargaining representative for decades, where
those employees, without the opportunity to vote in an
election or otherwise express their consent or opposition,
have been directed to accept representation by different
local unions that, in the past, have opposed their jurisdic-
tional interests.
Discussion
Requests for review are governed by Section 102.67(c)
of the Board’s Rules and Regulations. Section 102.67(c)
states:
The Board will grant a request for review only where
compelling reasons exist therefor. Accordingly, a re-
quest for review may be granted only upon one or more
of the following grounds:
(1) That a substantial question of law or policy is
raised because of (i) the absence of, or (ii) a depar-
ture from, officially reported Board precedent.
(2) That the Regional Director’s decision on a sub-
stantial factual issue is clearly erroneous on the
record and such error prejudicially affects the
rights of a party.
(3) That the conduct of the hearing or any ruling made
in connection with the proceeding has resulted in
prejudicial error.
(4) That there are compelling reasons for reconsidera-
tion of an important Board rule or policy.
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD4
(Emphasis added.) At present, the Board is only consider-
ing whether or not to grant the Request for Review filed by
Carpenters Local 2403. Consequently, it is premature to
address the issues that the Board would need to carefully
evaluate in a decision on the merits after granting review,
and I do not prejudge these issues. However, I believe my
colleagues incorrectly decide to deny review, which means
the Board will not examine the issues raised here. Contrary
to my colleagues, I believe the Regional Director’s decision
gives rise to substantial issues that warrant granting Carpen-
ters Local 2403’s Request for Review.
1. Departure from Electric Boat. As noted above,
Electric Boat is the Board’s first and thus far only deci-
sion dealing with the representational consequences of a
Carpenters local union’s expulsion from an AFL–CIO
Metal Trades Department affiliate. In Electric Boat, the
Regional Director (Region 1) directed an election in a
separate unit of carpenters and joiners at the United
States Navy submarine shipyard in Groton, Connecticut.
As in this case, the petitioning Carpenters local union
had recently been expelled from a multiunion group—
similar to the Council in this case—affiliated with the
Metal Trades Department. The Board granted the
multiunion group’s request for review on August 14,
2014, and on April 30, 2015, affirmed the Regional Di-
rector’s decision and direction of election. By contrast,
the Regional Director here, addressing virtually identical
facts, has dismissed the petition for an election.
In the instant case, the Regional Director issued his
decision on October 16, 2014, 6 months before the
Board’s decision on review in Electric Boat. In dismiss-
ing Carpenters Local 2403’s election petition, the Re-
gional Director stressed that Region 1’s decision in Elec-
tric Boat had no precedential value because it was still
before the Board on review. However, as noted above,
the Board issued its decision on review in Electric Boat
on April 30, 2015, finding that the Regional Director had
properly directed an election, contrary to the Regional
Director’s dismissal of the petition here. Consequently,
there now is Board precedent that establishes the appro-
priateness of conducting an election in circumstances
that are materially indistinguishable from the instant
case.
The Regional Director here also reasoned that Electric
Boat was factually distinguishable because the carpenters
and joiners there worked under separate supervision.
The Board, however, has never held that evidence of
common supervision, by itself, defeats a separate craft
unit. To the contrary, supervision is just one factor
among several others that may bear on the appropriate-
ness of a separate craft unit. See, e.g., The Mirage Casi-
no-Hotel, 338 NLRB 529, 533 fn. 20 (2002). Moreover,
in other respects it appears that this case is indistinguish-
able from Electric Boat. For example, like the carpen-
ters and millwrights in the instant case, the carpenters
and joiners in Electric Boat worked throughout the site in
close proximity to other craft employees, and the work of
the carpenters and joiners in Electric Boat was extensive-
ly integrated with the work of the other crafts; and these
facts did not defeat the appropriateness of a separate unit
of carpenters and joiners. Similarly, in Electric Boat as
here, the employees at issue performed almost all of the
tasks that were within the petitioning union’s jurisdic-
tion. Strict adherence to craft jurisdictional lines has
been recognized by the Board as an especially important
factor. See, e.g., Mirage Casino-Hotel, supra, 338
NLRB at 533 (noting importance attached to jurisdiction
in seminal Board cases). I believe these considerations
warrant a conclusion that the Regional Director’s finding
that Electric Boat should be distinguished from this case
gives rise to substantial issues that warrant review.
Moreover, Electric Boat and this case are likely to be
merely the first two of many cases raising similar ques-
tions based on the expulsion of Carpenters local unions
from multiunion entities, where the multiunion entity
functions as a sitewide representative, and subsidiary
local unions perform day-to-day representation and nego-
tiate subsidiary agreements. This type of bargaining
structure, with representational responsibilities allocated
between a multiunion entity and subsidiary local unions,
including Carpenters locals, is common in many Federal
defense and energy facilities. The existence of conflict-
ing decisions in this area will create uncertainty for em-
ployees, unions, employers and Regional Directors,
which I believe the Board should endeavor to avoid.
2. Potential Clearly Erroneous Factual Findings.
Section 102.67(c)(2) of the Board’s Rules and Regula-
tions states review should be granted if a Regional Direc-
tor’s “decision on a substantial factual issue is clear-
ly erroneous on the record and such error prejudicially
affects the rights of a party.” The Regional Director’s
decision in the instant case is based on an extremely de-
tailed, extensive record, and I believe at least two factual
findings by the Regional Director give rise to substantial
questions as to whether they are clearly erroneous and
prejudicial to Carpenters Local 2403.
First, the Regional Director found that carpenters and
millwrights are separate crafts, which warrants their be-
ing separately represented by different subsidiary local
unions, the Sheet Metal Workers and Machinists, respec-
tively. Certainly, there is a long history in the United
States—and in the work setting here—of disputes over
the precise jurisdictional lines between different craft
unions. However, it is also undisputed that at the Labor-
BATTELLE MEMORIAL INSTITUTE 5
atory, the carpenters and millwrights, for decades, were
represented by a single subsidiary local union, Carpen-
ters Local 2403. More generally, the Carpenters Interna-
tional was founded in the late 19th century, and through-
out most of its history, its local unions have represented
carpenters, joiners and millwrights, all of whom are often
simply termed “carpenters” in industry parlance. Nor is
there substantial evidence that carpenters and millwrights
in the maintenance industry previously have been
grouped in separate units.1 Further, many other well-
established unions represent separate-but-related craft
employees, including (i) the International Brotherhood of
Boilermakers, Iron Shipbuilders, Blacksmiths, Forgers
and Helpers; (ii) the Operative Plasterers and Cement
Masons International Association; and (iii) the United
Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the
Plumbing and Pipefitting Industry. Thus, I believe the
Regional Director’s finding that carpenters and mill-
wrights constitute separate crafts that warrant separate
bargaining units raises a substantial question as to
whether it is clearly erroneous, given the record evidence
in this case and our country’s long history of having a
single union represent separate-but-related crafts in a
single bargaining unit.
Second, I believe that similar questions are raised by
the Regional Director’s finding that the work of carpen-
ters and millwrights is not sufficiently skilled to be a
“true craft unit” under Burns & Roe Services Corp., 313
NLRB 1307 (1994). This appears to be contradicted by
the Council’s website, which states that each of its 15
affiliates “represents a distinct group of craft employees
at Hanford.” Although the Regional Director relied heav-
ily on evidence that there were no carpenter or millwright
apprenticeship programs at the Laboratory, there is no
evidence that other crafts at the Laboratory have appren-
ticeship programs, so this would defeat “craft” status for
all employees represented by different Council-affiliated
subsidiary local unions at the Laboratory. Moreover, the
Board has made clear that formal apprenticeship is not a
prerequisite for the skilled status necessary for a craft.
See, e.g., Mirage Casino-Hotel, supra, 338 NLRB at 533
(discounting absence of apprenticeship program); Wal-
Mart Stores, Inc., 328 NLRB 904, 907 (1999) (same).
There is also substantial record evidence suggesting that
the work of carpenters and millwrights requires signifi-
cant skill.2

1 Electric Boat dealt with “carpenters” and “joiners,” and the peti-
tioned-for unit included both carpenters and joiners.
2 It is undisputed that the carpenters and millwrights fabricate unique
items that are each designed to order by Laboratory’s nuclear scientists.
Although the record does not elaborate on the nature of these items
3. Fundamental Policy Considerations. I also be-
lieve that Board review is appropriate based on Section
102.67(c)(4) of the Board’s Rules and Regulations,
which states review should be granted when there are
“compelling reasons for reconsideration of an important
Board . . . policy.” The Act states that the Board’s fun-
damental responsibility, when making bargaining unit
determinations, is to “decide in each case” what bargain-
ing unit will “assure to employees the fullest freedom in
exercising the rights guaranteed by this Act.”3 In the
instant case, as described above, the carpenters and mill-
wrights had decades-old representation by Carpenters
Local 2403. Without an election, based on an intra-
union matter (specifically, the Carpenters International’s
withdrawal from the AFL–CIO), the carpenters and
millwrights were subdivided into separate groups and
assigned to be represented by different subsidiary unions,
the Sheet Metal Workers and Machinists, respectively.4

(perhaps for compelling security reasons), the testimony appears to
leave no question that they require skill and precision.
3 Sec. 9(b) (emphasis added). The legislative history of this lan-
guage in Sec. 9(b) demonstrates that it resulted from extensive delibera-
tion. See Macy’s, Inc., 361 NLRB No. 4, slip op. at 25–27 (2014)
(Member Miscimarra, dissenting).
4 In reaching his decision, the Regional Director purported to follow
Mallinckrodt Chemical Works, 162 NLRB 387 (1966). In finding that
the Regional Director properly followed the Mallinckrodt factors, my
colleagues overlook that we have never before sanctioned an applica-
tion of those criteria that required employees to leave their existing
union and be represented, against their wishes, by different unions. The
majority states that the Council was the “exclusive collective-
bargaining representative” of the Laboratory’s carpenters and mill-
wrights and that such status remains unchanged. But that is not correct
and that mistake is the fatal flaw in the majority’s analysis. The Coun-
cil was the exclusive representative of carpenters and millwrights only
in negotiations over the CBA. Carpenters Local 2403 performed the
essential function of representing them in Appendix A negotiations, in
grievance-arbitration matters, and in all other day-to-day labor relations
matters during the CBA term. To the extent that the Council played
any role in those critical functions, its role was ancillary and formulaic.
Further, Metropolitan Opera Assn., Inc., 327 NLRB 740 (1999), and
Houdaille Industries, Inc. Houdaille-Duval-Wright Co. Division, 183
NLRB 678 (1970), provide no support for the majority’s position. The
former involved an attempt to create a smaller unit represented by the
same union that had always represented the employees in question, and
the latter was an instance in which the certified bargaining representa-
tive had expressly designated another union as the representative of a
smaller employee group. Neither case remotely resembled what we
have here—compelling employees to leave their chosen union for an-
other union to which they object. Moreover, my colleagues ignore the
undisputed evidence that the new unions that the carpenters and mill-
wrights are being compelled to accept have historically taken jurisdic-
tional positions adverse to their most fundamental job opportunity
interests. That alone is more than sufficient evidence of prejudice and
conflict of interest. Thus, forcing carpenters and millwrights to be
represented by new unions is, in fact, legally unprecedented and hardly
preserves a stable labor relations status quo for Mallinckrodt purposes.
To the contrary, such a dictatorial result squarely conflicts with the
free-choice provisions of the Act.
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD6
Moreover, although the new subsidiary unions cannot be
faulted for this, it appears that in the past, the jurisdic-
tional interests of carpenters and millwrights at the La-
boratory had been opposed by the Sheet Metal Workers
and Machinists.
Especially because the Board and a different Regional
Director, in Electric Boat, supra, resolved these issues in
a manner contrary to the Regional Director’s decision
here, I believe this case gives rise to substantial questions
regarding an “important Board . . . policy.” Moreover,
the Act precludes employer recognition or Board certifi-
cation of unions that do not have majority support.5 See,
e.g., The American Bottling Co., Inc. d/b/a Dr. Pepper
Snapple Group, 357 NLRB 1804, 1812–1813 (2011). As
the Supreme Court stated in NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co.,
395 U.S. 575 (1969): “The Board itself has recognized,
and continues to do so here, that secret elections are gen-
erally the most satisfactory—indeed the preferred—
method of ascertaining whether a union has majority
support.” Id. at 602 (footnote omitted).
Conclusion
As indicated above, I do not reach or decide the issues
that would be appropriate for the Board to resolve in the
instant case if we were to grant the request for review
filed by Carpenters Local 2303. However, the request
for review raises issues that have been resolved in a con-
trary manner by the Board and a different Regional Di-
rector, the decision we are asked to review involves im-
portant factual determinations regarding what constitutes
a cognizable “craft” and whether two related crafts
should or must be represented by different unions in sep-
arate bargaining units, and whether employees can be
required to have different union representation in the
circumstances presented here, where the Board will not
permit the employees to decide for themselves whether
they wish to be represented by their traditional local un-
ion instead. These are each important issues, and when
considered together, they constitute especially compel-
ling reasons to grant review.

5 The Regional Director’s decision states that the Council was certi-
fied as the bargaining representative in 1949. The record does not
support that, and it is implausible in any event because the Council did
not have a bargaining relationship with the Laboratory until 1965.
Presumably, the Council’s representative status in overall contract
negotiations was a matter of consent among the craft unions involved.
For the foregoing reasons, I respectfully dissent from
my colleagues’ denial of the request for review.
Dated, Washington, D.C. February 18, 2016
______________________________________
Philip A. Miscimarra, Member
NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
APPENDIX
DECISIONAND ORDER
I. SUMMARY
The Employer operates the Pacific Northwest National
Laboratory (“PNNL), a United States Department of Energy
facility located in Richland, Washington. The Employer
recognizes the Intervenor (or “HAMTC”) as the collective
bargaining representative of approximately 240 employees
employed at PNNL. Historically HAMTC has consisted of
13 separate local trade unions of which these employees are
members. Earlier this year, after a lengthy dispute, HAMTC
removed the Petitioner from the HAMTC organization. Since
the Petitioner’s removal (which the parties at hearing re-
ferred to as a disaffiliation), the approximately 21 carpenters
and millwrights employed by the Employer have been repre-
sented by other HAMTC member unions.
Petitioner filed the instant petition seeking to sever the
Employer’s carpenters and millwrights, eight job classifica-
tions in all, from the existing HAMTC unit and to repre-
sent them in a separate unit. However, HAMTC opposes the
petition on the basis the current multi-craft bargaining unit is
an integrated whole with a long stable and productive bargain-
ing history. The Employer takes no position on the appropri-
ateness of the petitioned-forunit.
Ihave carefully reviewed and considered the record evidence,
and the arguments of the Petitioner and the Intervenor at
both the hearing and in their post-hearing briefs. Consistent
with the Intervenor, I find that based on the evidence and
the Board’s craft severance standard as articulated in
Mallinckrodt Chemical Works, 162 NLRB 387, 393 (1967),
the unit sought by Petitioner cannot be properly severed from
the existing unit as a separate craft unit.
Below I have set forth the record evidence relating to the fac-
tors the Board considers with respect to petitions for craft sever-
ance. Following that is an analysis of the Mallinckrodt standard,
as well as my application of that standard to the record before
me. In conclusion, I have set forth my Order dismissing the
instant petition and address the procedures for requesting
reviewof this decision.
BATTELLE MEMORIAL INSTITUTE 7
II. RECORD EVIDENCE
A. BACKGROUND
PNNL is part of the Hanford site, a sprawling Department of
Energy complex located on the Columbia River near Rich-
land, Washington. Thousands of researchers and scientists are
employed at the PNNL campus, working in numerous build-
ings and laboratories. In addition to PNNL, the Hanford site
contains a separate decommissioned Department of Energy
plutonium processing facility, where significant waste man-
agement and environmental restoration work is performed by
numerous contractors. HAMTC has also had long stable collec-
tive-bargaining relationships with most of these other contrac-
tors.
HAMTC, an affiliation of trade unions, was certified as
the exclusive collective bargaining representative of various
employees at the Hanford site in 1949. HAMTC has negotiat-
ed successive collective bargaining agreements with the
various contractors at Hanford in the subsequent 65 years.
The Employer has operated PNNL since 1965, and the Em-
ployer and HAMTC have been party to numerous collective
bargaining agreements during that time, the most recent of
which was effective from 2010 to 2013. The Employer and
HAMTC are currently engaged in successor contract nego-
tiations. Thus, no party raises a contract as a bar to further pro-
cessing of the instant petition.
During HAMTC’s 65 years of representation, labor relations
at the Hanford site have been generally uneventful, with min-
imal history of strikes, lockouts, or other work stoppages.
There have been two strikes during Battelle’s operation of
PNNL, but the last one occurred almost 40 years ago in
1976. During the same period, HAMTC and the Hanford
contractors have negotiated numerous collective bargaining
agreements
Until June 1, 2014, Petitioner was one of the 13 affiliated lo-
cal unions that constituted HAMTC.2 At that time, HAMTC
disaffiliated Petitioner, the culmination of a 15-year dispute
involving Petitioner and Intervenor’s respective parent organiza-
tions. Following disaffiliation HAMTC directed that carpen-
ters and millwrights would be represented by the Sheet Metal
Workers and Machinists respectively.
Until June 2014, Petitioner had 77 members, all of
whom are employed at the Hanford site. Of these members,
21 are employed by Battelle at PNNL and are the subject of the

2 In addition to Petitioner, member unions include: International
Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Local 242 (“Boilermakers”); Interna-
tional Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Locals 77 and 984 (col-
lectively “IBEW” or “Electricians”); International Union of Operating
Engineers, Local 280 (“Operating Engineers”); International Union of
Painters and Allied Trades, Local 437 (“Painters”); International
Association of Machinists, Local 1951 (“Machinists”); United Asso-
ciation of Plumbers and Pipefitters, Local 598 (“Pipefitters”); Interna-
tional Association of Insulators, Local 120 (“Insulators”); International
Association of Bridge, Structural, Ornamental and Reinforcing Iron
Workers, Local 14 (“lronworkers”); Sheet Metal Workers Internation-
al Association, Local 55 (“Sheet Metal Workers”); United Steelwork-
ers, Local 12-369 (“Steelworkers”); and International Brotherhood of
Teamsters, Local839(“Teamsters”).
instant petition. The remainder of the carpenters and mill-
wrights represented by HAMTC are employed by other con-
tractors on the Hanford site. Thus, the instant petition does not
involve carpenters or millwrights working for these other con-
tractors.
B. EMPLOYEES AT ISSUE
1. True Craft or Functionally Distinct Department
Petitioner seeks to sever 21 carpenters and millwrights
from an existing bargaining unit consisting of tradespersons in
13 separate crafts, approximately 240 employees total. This
existing unit of HAMTC represented employees is largely
located in the Employer’s Maintenance and Fabrication Ser-
vices department (“maintenance department”) and is general-
ly referred to bythe parties as a maintenance unit.
Maintenance department employees perform traditional
maintenance work, as well as fabrication work unique to
PNNL. Traditional maintenance work involves repairs, inspec-
tions, and preventative maintenance. Fabrication involves cre-
ating specialized “widgets” for the PNNL researchers;
unique items needed by the researchers,·but that cannot
simply be purchased.3 Instead, widgets must be designed
and built by the maintenance department employees in close
conjunction with the scientific staff.
Within the maintenance department the Employer rec-
ognizes the separate craft jurisdictions of each HAMTC
union. Accordingly the carpenters and millwrights have ex-
clusive jurisdictions and perform all work within those two
separate jurisdictions. Specifically, carpenters build scaffold-
ing, shipping crates, and widgets made of wood, plastic,
and Plexiglas. They also perform roofing work, work with
doors on tasks such as lock installation and repair and weath-
er-stri pping, and open all shipping crates. Millwrights are
responsible for machine alignment, as well as the maintenance
and inspections of pump shafts, motors, hoisting and rigging.
Metal work in general is divided by the gauge of the metal,
with millwrights handling metal below a certain gauge and
sheet metal workers handling metal above a certain gauge.
Millwrights are also responsible for filter changes in PNNL’s
specialized air filtration system.
One implication of the strict observation of jurisdi ctional
lines is that the work of each employee is almost exclusively
limited to their trade; few tasks have not been claimed as
exclusive by one trade or another. The maintenance depart-
ment manager estimated that an employee in the maintenance
department, regardless of trade, spends approximately 90 per-
cent of their work dayexclusively performing craft specific work.
Jurisdictional lines have some bearing on the tools and
equipment used by maintenance department employees. The
maintenance department maintains a primary shop and sever-
al satellite shops at the PNNL campus. Two of the satellite
shops contain tools frequently used by carpenters, such as
band saws and Plexiglas heaters. The evidence is in dispute

3 Because fabrication work is varied and the designed items are
unique, witnesses at hearing and the parties on brief simply refer to the
fabricated items collectively as “widgets.” Thus, the term is used in the
same manner in this Decision
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD8
regarding whether any of these tools are craft specific. Several
tools, such as a band saw, are described by some witnesses as
craft specific, in that a carpenter is the only craft to use a blade
for cutting wood on a band saw. However, carpenters are not
the only craft with the skill, knowledge, or need to use a band
saw, as a different craft may use a band saw with a different
blade for cutting metal.
Carpenters and millwrights receive some training not provid-
ed to other crafts, based on their exclusive jurisdiction over
these tasks. Carpenters are the only craft that receives scaffold-
ing and locksmith training. Millwrights are the only trade
that receives laser alignment training, and training related to
manipulator arm installation and maintenance.
Organizationally, the maintenance department is divided
into 5 work groups, with each work group consisting of be-
tween 2 and 4 work teams. Nine of the 11 work teams con-
sist of employees in multiple crafts, with varying degrees of
mixing. The petitioned-for carpenters and millwrights are
located on 6 work teams, which also include electricians,
teamsters, pipefitters, painters, and machinists. As a per-
centage of their work teams, carpenters and millwrights
together make up between 5 percent (a single millwright in
the 17 person “Physical Sciences Facilities 1” work team)
and 31 percent (7 carpenters and millwrights on the 22 person
“RCHN1” work team).
The work teams include location- and purpose-based teams.
Location based work teams are assigned to a certain building
and perform most of the maintenance work at the assigned
location. The Physical Sciences Facilities 1 work team, men-
tioned above, performs most of the maintenance in the Phys-
ical Sciences Facilities 1 building. Teams with a specific
purpose perform one specific task throughout the PNNL
campus. For example, the Custodial and Floor Services work
team will perform all carpet replacement, regardless of loca-
tion at PNNL. Each work team is supervised by a team lead-
er, who in turn reports to a group lead, who reports to the
maintenance department manager.4
At the beginning of each day, the maintenance depart-
ment manager, the group leads, and the team leaders meet to
distribute work assignments for the day. The team leaders
then take these assignments to their respective team’s report
location and distribute assignments to the individual employ-
ees. The record indicates that normally assignments require
multiple crafts to complete a task. Who will perform what
work is a decision that is made throughout the assignment
process, with the maintenance department manager, the
group leads, and the team leaders all making these deci-
sions in the assignment process. An assignment may desig-
nate a “lead craft,” but such a designation is not required.
The Employer performs all hiring for the maintenance
department; union hiring halls are not utilized. The Em-
ployer does not require applicants to have completed an
apprenticeship for their craft, and the Employer does not

4 The parties stipulate that the work group team leaders are su-
pervisors within the definition of § 2( 11) of the Act. It also appears
that the parties have historically excluded the work group team leaders
from theexisting unit.
provide an apprenticeship program. However, after hire the
Employer provides all new maintenance department employ-
ees core training related to working at the Hanford site. As
described above employees receive some limited craft specif-
ic training as well.
2. History of Collective Bargaining of Employees Sought to be
Represented
a. Contract Bargaining
The Employer and HAMTC have negotiated multiple
collective bargaining agreements covering employees’ terms
and conditions of employment over the last 50 years. These
agreements address employees’ terms and conditions of
employment as a single group, without reference to craft,
although in areas, such as wages, craft differences are rec-
ognized. The agreement also contains an “Appendix A”
specific to each craft. This appendix contains the job de-
scriptions for the classifications in each craft, and a descrip-
tion of the craft’s jurisdiction. When bargaining on a suc-
cessor contract is set to begin, the affiliate unions have the
ability to request their Appendix A be re-opened if they
have craft specific issues to address.
It is undisputed that when Appendix A bargaining occurs,
both a HAMTC representative and a representative of the
germane member union meet with the Employer’s repre-
sentative. However, Petitioner and HAMTC disagree regard-
ing the relative roles of the union representatives at the
table. Petitioner maintains that its representative negotiates
the agreement, while the HAMTC representative is present
as a passive note taker or observer. HAMTC asserts it
negotiates any changes, and the craft representative is mere-
ly present to assist. However, the record reveals that final
authority rests with HAMTC rather than with a member
union over a final Appendix A agreement. Further, HAMTC
reviews negotiated appendices to ensure that no conflicts
exist relative to the other trades’ respective work jurisdic-
tions. Regardless of the specific dynamics at the bargaining
table, no changes in a craft’s Appendix A takes place until
the appendices are incorporated into a successor collective
bargaining agreement, which is ratified as a whole.
According to Petitioner’s business representative, Petition-
er re-opened its respective Appendix A in both 2005 and
2010, proposing additional training, a new procedure for
transferring between teams, increased pay, and changes in
overtime procedures. There is no assertion that these pro-
posals were outside the bounds of acceptable Appendix A
bargaining, or that they were somehow inappropriate pro-
posals. However, it also appears from the record the Em-
ployer rejected the proposals outright, or said it would
take them under consideration; regardless, no such changes
took place. A successor collective bargaining agreement was
executed in each instance; the lack of agreement on the
Appendix A applicable to carpenters did not prevent an
overall agreement. There is no evidence in the record of
any individual affiliate union entering into any contract,
memorandum of understanding, side agreement, or other
binding agreement with the Employer separate fromHAMTC.
BATTELLE MEMORIAL INSTITUTE 9
Under the collective bargaining agreement between the Em-
ployer and HAMTC, each HAMTG affiliate union is entitled
to a chief steward. Further, when successor contract bargain-
ing begins, HAMTC creates a bargaining committee consisting
of the chief steward of each affiliate union. Each affiliate
union is entitled to a chief steward, not each craft. Because
Petitioner has historically represented two separate crafts,
carpenters and millwrights, these two crafts have had a single
representative at the bargaining table.
HAMTC and the Employer are currently bargaining for a
successor agreement, and presently, disaffiliation has not
modified HAMTC’s bargaining committee. At the time
bargaining began, prior to disaffiliation, Petitioner’s chief
steward was placed on the bargaining committee. To date he
has retained this position. However, it does not appear to be
in dispute that in the next round of collective bargaining,
this will not be the case because HAMTC will have one less
representative, and the carpenters and millwrights will be rep-
resented by the Sheet Metal Workers and Machinists respec-
tively. However, this is not to say that the Petitioner’s
current chief steward or some other carpenter and/or mill-
wright could not beselected as a future chief steward.
b. Grievance Handling
In addition to chief stewards, the Employer also recogniz-
es primary stewards and shop stewards. As noted above,
chief stewards have a role at the bargaining table; shop stew-
ards are primarily involved in grievance processing. Within
the ranks of the shop stewards, a single steward in each
craft is designated the primary steward. The record suggests
the primary steward has greater responsibility for jurisdictional
grievances, but the nature and extent of this responsibility are
not fully detailed in the record.
Step 1 in the grievance process involves the shop steward
and front-line supervisor attempting a resolution on the shop
floor. If step 1 does not resolve the dispute, a grievance is
reduced to writing by the shop steward and submitted to
HAMTC’s grievance committee, step 2 in the grievance pro-
cess. HAMTC’s grievance committee consists of a representa-
tive from each affiliate union. The committee determines
whether a grievance is advanced to arbitration on behalf of
HAMTC. Affiliate unions apparently have some ability to
advance grievances to arbitration if they pay the legal· fees and
costs, but the specifics of this ability to arbitrate independently
of HAMTC are not fully detailed in the record.
Since disaffiliation, Petitioner’s former chief steward has
become a shop steward with and a member of the Sheet Metal
Workers, although he continues to be recognized as the primary
steward for the carpenters. The pre-disaffiliation primary
steward of the millwrights is similarly still recognized as
the millwright’s primary steward, and he has become a
member of the Machinists. In regard to what changes
have resulted, the Petitioner’s former chief steward testified
that prior to disaffiliation he could decide whether to take a
grievance to arbitration, assuming Petitioner paid the as-
sociated costs. He maintains that as a primary or shop steward
he no longer has that ability, as he must submit any grievances
to the HAMTC committee and can only move grievances to
arbitration with HAMTC approval.
c. Jurisdictional Disputes andother Intra-Union Matters
Each member union in HAMTC has the ability to file a
grievance over a jurisdictional dispute. It is not clear from the
record whether only a chief steward can file a jurisdictional
grievance, or merely the practice has developed whereby the
chief steward usually handles jurisdi ctional grievances. Sheet
Metal Workers Chief Steward Kurt Watts testified that the
chief steward “...kind of makes the decision on what the
craft is going to do,” on a jurisdictional grievance, but did
not reference any rule or bylaw that dictated this approach. As
noted at other places in the record, the primary stewards
have a role in the filing and processing ofjurisdictional griev-
ances.
Once filed, the collective bargaining agreement establishes a
separate procedure for grievances addressing jurisdictional
disputes. At step 2, jurisdictional grievances are referred to
the Council Grievance Committee, a committee with a member
for each affiliate union. If the dispute cannot be resolved
by the committee, the involved unions may advance the
dispute to arbitration, if they choose to incur the associated
legal fees and costs.
With disaffiliation, Petitioner no longer has a representa-
tive on the Council Grievance Committee. Petitioner’s wit-
nesses assert this is a particularly damaging change, as the affil-
iate unions to which the carpenters and millwrights have been
assigned, Sheet Metal Workers and Machinists respectively,
are the entities with which they had the most jurisdi ctional
disputes.
The record contains examples of these disputes. Carpen-
ters and sheet metal workers have had jurisdictional disputes
in the past over the assembling of metal furniture and installa-
tion of metal items on walls, such as metal trim. In 1990 and
2012 the metal on walls issue progressed to arbitration. Peti-
tioner argues the net effect of eliminating the ability to
independently arbitrate jurisdictional disputes and removal
from the Council Grievance Committee will result in a break-
down of craftjurisdiction lines.
Petitioner provided a few examples of such a breakdown in
the record. Specifically, Petitioner maintains that following
disaffiliation, it was removed from the welding pool, elimi-
nating work from carpenters and millwrights. The record re-
veals that correspondence from HAMTC regarding disaffilia-
tion does clearly state that references to Petitioner shall be re-
moved from the welding pool documentation. However, mul-
tiple witnesses testified that the Employer no longer utilizes a
welding pool. Further, no carpenter or millwright testified that
they had ever performed work as part of the welding pool
or that their work had changed as a result of disaffiliation.
Another example of the jurisdictional concerns raised by
Petitioner is demonstrated by a jurisdictional grievance filed by
millwrights in July of 2014, after disaffiliation. Both the prima-
ry steward for the millwrights, and the machinist staff assistant
testified regarding the handling of the dispute. All parties
agree that the primary steward for the millwrights filed a griev-
ance over pipefitters assembling and disassembling A-frame
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD10
gantry cranes. Prior to reaching the Grievance Council at step
2, the Machinist staff assistant met the Pipefitters to attempt to
resolve the dispute and did so, reaching a resolution that stated
“. . . if there was a [sic] A-frame to be erected only [to] be
used by the pipefitters with no mechanical devices trolleys
etc. you would assemble and disassemble if for your craft
or membership only.” The Machinist staff assistant takes the
position that this resolution concedes nothing to the Pipefitters,
and that the Machinists fully protected the millwrights’ juris-
diction. The primary steward for the millwrights asserts that
this resolution conceded significant millwright work to the
Pipefitters but neither the primary steward nor Petitioner pro-
vided details or documents establishing the nature and extent
of millwright work purportedly conceded by the Machinists.
Petitioner also had a seat on HAMTC’s executive board
while a member union, that is no longer the case following the
disaffiliation. The record does not establish the impact of this
lost seat.
3. Separate Identity
The collective bargaining agreement between the Employer
and HAMTC establishes almost all of the bargaining unit em-
ployees’ terms and conditions of employment, outside of the
limited issues addressed in each craft’s respective Appendix A.
As such, all bargaining unit employees share the same insur-
ance and retirement benefits, vacation and holidays, working
hours and shift schedules, and are subject to the same work
rules. Seniority is calculated in the same manner for all
employees, although each craft maintains its own seniority
roster.
Transfers between crafts occur, but are not common. The
Employer’s labor relations manager estimated one employee per
year, in the last decade, had permanently transferred between
crafts, although three permanent transfers have taken place al-
ready in2014.
There is no contention that the carpenters and mill-
wrights have had a previous opportunity to obtain separate
representation. The record reveals and I take administrative
notice that a petition was filed with this Region in Case 19–RC–
14231 to sever a craft from a HAMTC bargaining unit at the
Hanford site in 2002. There, the Region issued a decision
denying the severance. I note that Case 19–RC–14213 in-
volved a different unit, employer, and petitioner but did involve
HAMTC as the Intervenor.
4. Degree of Integration of the Employer’s
Production Processes
The Employer’s maintenance department’s multi-craft
teams operate together to accomplish tasks, but do so along
jurisdictional lines. The record contains several examples of
multiple crafts working together to accomplish a task, in-
cluding door installation, fire inspections, andoffice relocations.
A door installation begins with a single work order. On site,
a teamster delivers the door to the location where it will be
installed. A carpenter will then un-box the door from its pack-
aging, and based on the type of door a carpenter or other
craft would perform the installation. A carpenter would then
perform any finishing tasks such as installing a lock or weath-
er-stripping.
When a fire inspection is required, a single work order
is created. A carpenter first inspects fire doors and walls.
The work order is then passed to a pipefitter, who inspects
the sprinkler heads and then passes the work order to a
sheet metal worker to inspect the fire dampers.
The Teamsters’ chief steward described his work installing
office furniture on the multi-craft “Grounds, Relocation, &
Receiving” work team. He is one of three employees regu-
larly assigned to perform this installation work, along with
another teamster and a carpenter. The carpenter rotates to
the Grounds, Relocation, & Receiving work team from
another work team. However, the parties did not provide
testimony or documents detailing the regularity or frequency
of temporary transfers among the various teams in the
existing unit. As described by the chief steward, he and an-
other teamster transport the materials to the installation
location where a carpenter assembles the furniture. Other
crafts, such as electricians, are called from other work teams
on an as needed basis to complete the installation.
The record also contains more general testimony regard-
ing the frequency of multiple crafts performing tasks togeth-
er. The IBEW chief steward described how it was frequent-
ly necessary for him to have a machine operator perform a
lock-out/tag-out procedure before the chief steward works
on power equipment. A carpenter acknowledged that he
frequently worked on service orders that required him to
work with the painters, teamsters, pipefitters, electricians
and other crafts assigned to his work team. Two other chief
stewards, a sheet metal worker, and a millwright, both testi-
fied they also work regularly, at times daily, with other
crafts on their work teams to complete tasks.
Although the Employer explicitly recognizes jurisdictional
lines in its collective bargaining agreement with HAMTC,
the line is not absolute: The parties have negotiated a “Craft
Alignment Program” that recognizes some basic efficiencies
given the close proximity of employees in separate crafts
working on multi-craft work teams. Under this program, an
employee in one craft can provide some very limited assis-
tance to another craft on a single task. The example de-
scribed in the record is of a teamster delivering items to a
carpenter who was building something. Under these circum-
stances, it is permissible for the teamster to brace something
or to essentially assist the carpenter to assemble or make a
connection without infringing on the carpenter’s jurisdiction.
5. Qualifications of the Union Seeking
Severance
It is not disputed that Petitioner is affiliated with the Pa-
cific Northwest Regional Council of Carpenters and the Unit-
ed Brotherhood of Carpenters, labor organizations that have
extensive experience representing carpenters and millwrights
in maintenance units.
There is no dispute that throughout its existence, Petition-
er has been an active labor organization, conducting regular
meetings and electing officers. Prior to disaffiliation, em-
ployees’ dues were deducted by the Employer and remitted
to Petitioner, who in turn paid a per capita amount to
HAMTC. Following disaffiliation, the carpenters and mill-
BATTELLE MEMORIAL INSTITUTE 11
wrights were required to pay dues or fees to other HAMTC
member unions as a condition of employment. Consistent
with this change, employees completed new dues deduction
authorizations, and the Employer now remits their dues to
the Sheet Metal Workers or Machinists, who in turn pay the
per capita to HAMTC.
Petitioner does acknowledge that carpenters and millwrights
represent distinctive and separate crafts, although Petitioner
maintains the two crafts are “brother crafts” historically
jointly represented by Petitioner.
6. Industry Pattern of Collective Bargaining
Intervenor asserts the proper industry for comparison is
other Department of Energy laboratories. The record con-
tains collective bargaining agreements between contractors
and metal trades councils at Department of Energy laborato-
ries in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, Amarillo, Texas, and Albu-
querque, New Mexico. At each of these operations, multiple
crafts are represented by a single multi-craft bargaining unit
for all maintenance personnel.
In response, Petitioner asserts that the Department of En-
ergy laboratories referenced above are more involved in na-
tional defense research as opposed to the research conducted
at PNNL. However, Petitioner’s assertion is not supported by
the record as Petitioner did not submit documents or tes-
timony detailing the full nature and extent of all operations
performed by the Employer at PNNL or at the other
comparator laboratories.
Petitioner also raises a number of differences in the
substance of HAMTC’s collective bargaining agreements
with the Employer (“HAMTC agreements”) and the collec-
tive bargaining agreements in the record covering other la-
boratories. Petitioner specifically points out that the agree-
ments Intervenor placed in the record differ from the
HAMTC agreements in regard to wages, job classifications,
employer organization, bumping rights, steward assignment,
and the process for establishing jurisdictional lines and
resolving jurisdictional disputes.
Petitioner further asserts the proper industry for compari-
son is instead marine maintenance in the Pacific Northwest.
Petitioner placed a number of labor agreements between
affiliates of Petitioner and employers in the marine mainte-
nance and shipbuilding industry, and specifically asserts the
Washington State Ferries maintenance unit in particular is
the best comparison, on the basis that the carpenters had
been represented by a metal trades council, but have been
represented in the two most recent bargaining cycles by an
affiliate of Petitioner. However, I note that the Washington
State Ferries’ labor agreements, like the HAMTC proffered
industry labor agreements, similarly contain significant sub-
stantive differences in terms and conditions of employment
from those present in the HAMTC agreements.
III. ANALYSIS
A. CRAFT SEVERANCE STANDARD
In allowing craft severance, whereby a group of employees
in a separate and distinct craft leave a larger, existing bar-
gaining unit, the Board balances the interest of the larger
group of employees in maintaining the stability of labor
relations, and the benefits of an historical plant-wide bar-
gaining unit, against the interest of a portion of that group in
having the freedom of choice to break away from the histori-
cal unit. Mallinckrodt Chemical Works, 162 NLRB 387, 392
(1966). Although it balances these interests, the Board has
not allowed severance lightly, as the party seeking sever-
ance clearly bears a “heavy burden.” Kaiser Foundation
Hospitals, 312 NLRB 933, 935 fn. 15 (1993). In placing this
heavy burden on a petitioner, the Board has explained it “is
reluctant, absent compelling circumstances, to disturb bar-
gaining units established by mutual consent where there has
been a long history of continuous bargaining, even in cases
where the Board would not have found the unit to be appropri-
ate if presented with the issue ab initio.” Id. at 936.
The Board in Mallinckrodt outlined the factors to be
considered when determining the issue of craft severance:
1) whether the proposed unit consists of a distinct and
homogeneous group of skilled journeymen craftsmen or a func-
tionally distinct department; 2) the collective-bargaining histo-
ry of the employees in the petitioned-for unit related to
those employees, and whether the existing patterns of bar-
gaining result in stable labor relations and whether that
stability will be upset by the end of the existing patterns
of representation; 3) the extent the petitioned-for unit has
maintained a separate identity during its inclusion in the
overall unit; 4) the degree of integration of the Employer’s
production processes; 5) the qualifications of the Union
seeking severance; and 6) the pattern of collective bargaining
inthe industry. Mallinckrodt at 397.
The heavy burden applied to a party seeking craft sev-
erance by the Board is reflected in its decisions following
Mallinckrodt. In Kaiser Foundation Hospitals, petitioner
sought to sever a group of skilled maintenance employees
from a unit of nonprofessional employees. Id. at 933. Apply-
ing the Mallinckrodt factors, the Board found the petitioned-
for employees were skilled maintenance employees sepa-
rately supervised from the other bargaining unit employees,
yet had not maintained a separate identity, given that terms and
conditions of employment, including hours of work, holidays,
health and pension benefits, vacation, seniority, and leave
were uniformly applied across the unit. Kaiser Foundation
Hospital, at 935–936. The Board noted the long history of
bargaining, 40 years, in the larger unit, with only two strikes
occurring in that time, and further noted the “predominately
stable” nature of this past representation. Id. The Board
concluded craft severance was not appropriate and specifi-
cally noted that it traditionally declined to sever a group of
maintenance employees from an existing production and
maintenance unit in the face of substantial bargaining history
on a plant-wide basis. Id. at 935.
The Board also addressed its craft severance principles in
Metropolitan Opera Ass’n., 327 NLRB 740 (1999). There,
petitioner sought to sever one group of performers, choristers,
from a historical unit consisting of several groups of per-
formers, stage managers, stage directors, and choreographers.
Id. at 740. In dismissing the petition, the Board specifically
noted that while the incumbent union had historically repre-
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD12
sented the existing/larger unit, it had also·allowed a chorus
committee to negotiate issues specific to the choristers but
only as an authorized arm of the incumbent union. Id.
The Board ultimately held that admitted differences in func-
tions, skills, and compensation did not “constitute a compel-
ling argument to disturb a 30-year history of continuous bar-
gaining and successful representation” in the broader unit. Id.
I now turn to an analysis of the instant record and the
craft severance factors considered by the Board when making
determinations in cases of this nature.
B. CRAFT SEVERANCE FACTORS
1. True Craft or Functionally Distinct Department
A true craft unit is one consisting of a distinct and ho-
mogenous group of skilled journeymen craftsmen, with skill
acquired by a substantial period of apprenticeship or its
equivalent, together with their apprentices and/or helpers.
Burns & Roe Services Corp., 313 NLRB 1307, 1308 (1994).
In practice, this requires analyzing the existence of formal
training and apprenticeship programs, functional integration,
overlap of duties, whether assignments are based on need or
made along craft lines, and common interests in wages and
other terms and conditions of employment. Id.
Petitioner asserts the carpenters and millwrights constitute a
true craft because they are a distinct and homogenous group of
skilled journeymen craftsmen. However, there is no conten-
tion they are organized in a functionally distinct department.
Functional integration and a common interest in wages and
other terms and conditions of employment are addressed in
detail below where the record reveals a lack for support for
the instant petition. Thus, I turn to whether the remaining
considerations regarding this factor, including the existence or
lack of a formal training and apprenticeship program, and
whether assignments are based on need or made along craft
lines, are sufficient to establish the carpenters and millwrights
as a true craft.
The Employer performs all hiring; there is no contention
that a union hiring hall or some other mechanism gives Peti-
tioner or Intervenor any control over applicants or the quali-
fications of these applicants. Minimal qualifications certainly
exist, but the minimum requirements are of the Employer’s
creation. The Employer does not require carpenter or mill-
wright applicants to have completed an apprenticeship for their
craft, to have or maintain journeyman status, and the Employer
does not provide an apprenticeship program. While employees
receive limited craft specific training after hire, for example
the scaffolding and locksmith training provided to carpen-
ters, that training is not extensive enough to be considered
an alternative to an apprenticeship. Moreover, the Employer
does not employ any “apprentices” or “helpers” in the existing
unit.
Petitioner’s argument in favor of the petitioned-for unit’s
true craft status is based on the Employer’s recognition of
jurisdictional lines. While the Employer does not require
formal training or an apprenticeship, it clearly recognizes
craft jurisdiction in making work assignments. The record
evidence as a whole, from witness testimony to the language
of the most recent collective bargaining agreement, clearly
reveals that jurisdiction is guarded by all of the HAMTC trades.
This has a significant impact on existing unit employees’ work,
as the maintenance department manager testified 90 percent of
an existing unit employee’s day is devoted to the exclusive
work of the employee’s trade. That said, while work as-
signments are made with respect to craft lines, the Employ-
er does not organize itself along craft lines. Rather, the rec-
ord establishes that the Employer’s maintenance department
consists of work teams that are multi-craft, especially as it
applies to multi-craft teams that include carpenters or mill-
wrights.
I also agree with Intervenor that, in function, there is no ba-
sis for finding carpenters and millwrights are a “distinct and
homogenous group” separate from the other trades. Petition-
er’s arguments, which are focused on the exclusive work of each
trade, highlight the differences between the two groups of
employees it now seeks to represent in a separate unit. It is
undisputed that the carpenters and millwrights have a histo-
ry of joint representation. Yet in regard to their work, they are
either two parts of a large functionally integrated department,
or two distinct crafts Petitioner seeks to sever into one unit.
Under this factor, there is no basis in the record for finding,
and Petitioner does not contend, that carpenters and mill-
wrights somehow constitute a singlecraft.
While the Employer certainly respects jurisdictional lines,
this alone is not synonymous with belonging to a true craft
unit. Here the Employer does not utilize a hiring hall, offers no
apprenticeship program, does not utilize apprentices or helpers,
and does not require completion of an apprenticeship or any
sort of journeyman status as a condition of employment. Fur-
ther, as discussed in the following sections, the Employer’s
multi-craft teams are functionally integrated, and share
many of the same terms and conditions of employment with
the other trades.
In light of the above and the record as a whole, I find that
the petitioned-for unit is neither a true craft unit, for the pur-
poses of severance, nor a functionally distinct department.
Accordingly, this factor weighs against Petitioner meeting its
heavy burden of demonstratingcraftseveranceisappropriate.
2. History of Collective Bargaining of Employees Sought
to be Represented
There is no evidence that HAMTC has been lacking in
its representation of the bargaining unit as a whole, or the
carpenters and millwrights specifically, during its lengthy 50-
year tenure. The history of HAMTC and the Employer during
this period, two strikes in 50 years, is analogous to the history
in Kaiser Foundation, where two strikes occurred in 40 years
of representation. In that decision, the Board described the
relationship as “predominately stable,” and cited the long histo-
ry of stable and productive labor relations as a primary reason
not to disturb the existing bargaining relationship. Kaiser
Foundation, 312 NLRB at 936. Similarly, in Metropolitan
Opera, the Board accentuated the importance of the existing
bargaining re1ationship as the critical aspect of the unit’s
labor history. Metropolitan Opera Ass’n., 327 NLRB at 740.
The role played by the chorus committee in Metropolitan
Opera is analogous to the historic role Petitioner has played
BATTELLE MEMORIAL INSTITUTE 13
in Appendix A bargaining. There, as here, a representative
of a part of a bargaining unit bargained with the employer
on concerns specific to the choristers as a representative of
the certified collective bargaining representative. Here, there
is also little doubt that Petitioner historically has been provided
an opportunity equal to that of any other affiliate union to
represent the interests of its members.
This raises a factual consideration not present in Kaiser
Foundation and Metropolitan Opera: disaffiliation. If the
50-year history of stable and productive labor relations
between HAMTC and the Employer weighs heavily against
Petitioner’s argument, the question then is whether the
changes since disaffiliation are sufficient to make reliance on
this history misplaced.
Petitioner argues that following disaffiliation, carpenters
and millwrights “lost” a chief steward, and accordingly a seat
on the HAMTC bargaining committee, grievance committee,
and executive board. However, this is not an accurate de-
scription of what has transpired, as carpenters and mill-
wrights have not been left unrepresented, but are now rep-
resented by the Sheet Metal Workers and Machinists. As
such, they still have a chief steward, but it is a chief stew-
ard that is shared with the existing employees in these affili-
ate unions. Prior to disaffiliation, Petitioner represented two
separate crafts in a single affiliate union and carpenters and
millwrights shared a chief steward. After disaffiliation, car-
penters now share a chief steward with sheet metal workers
while millwrights share a chief steward with machinists. In
short, neither carpenters nor the millwrights appear to have
actually lost much as far as the chief steward position is con-
cerned.
Petitioner further argues that the carpenters and machin-
ists do not trust their new trade representatives. Specifically,
Petitioner speculates that the Sheet Metal Workers and Ma-
chinists, who have had jurisdictional disputes with Petitioner
in the past, will take advantage of the new additions, but
Petitioner has not presented any evidence to substantiate
such speculation. Neither the welding pool nor the A-frame
examples provided by Petitioner demonstrate any significant
harm to the carpenters or millwrights.
In regard to the welding pool, as an initial matter, the rec-
ord discloses that the welding pool no longer exists in prac-
tice, rendering changes in documents largely moot. Second, a
distinction must be made between changes in Petitioner’s
role and the role of carpenters and millwrights. After dis-
affiliation, HAMTC clearly requested the Employer to re-
move references to Petitioner in a multitude of documents.
However, it does not consequently follow that this removal
led to any significant changes as far as the 21 carpenters’ and
millwrights’ respective work is concerned. Indeed, the rec-
ord reveals insufficient evidence to establish the nature and
extent of changes argued by Petitioner in this regard.
Moreover, the A-frame grievance example is of minimal
support to Petitioner’s argument. Faced with the first juris-
dictional grievance submitted by millwrights, the Machinists
utilized HAMTC’s internal process to resolve a dispute in
what, by all appearances, was good faith. Representatives
of the carpenters and millwrights testified that it was less
than a total victory, but the evidence is mixed and does
not support the conclusion that the Machinists somehow
inappropriately traded away millwright work to another
HAMTC craft.
I recognize that the jurisdictional concerns of the car-
penters and millwrights are arguably reasonable, as the
record does contain evidence of long running disputes, up
to and including arbitration, on issues such as the assem-
bling of metal furniture and installation of metal items
on walls. However, carpenters and millwrights have
these jurisdictional disputes with sheet metal workers and
machinists because they are the trades with whom they re-
spectively have much in common. Further, Petitioner faults
HAMTC for its placement of carpenters and millwrights
respectively with the Sheet Metal Workers and Machinists.
However, conversely, it does not seem preferable to
place carpenters and millwrights with trades with whom
they rarely interact based on a fear of potential jurisdi ctional
disputes. Indeed, under the circumstances,· it is equally rea-
sonable to place carpenters with the Sheet Metal Workers and
millwrights with the Machinists, as these two trades respec-
tively understand carpenters and millwrights better than
the other trades’ understandthepetitioned-for group.
The record reveals that the labor history of the petitioned-
for carpenters and millwrights as part of the existing unit has
been predominantly stable. Petitioner has raised only potential
concerns and has not produced any evidence establishing
anything near inappropriate or unfair representation at any
time relevant herein. Indeed, 65 years of Intervenor serving
as the umbrella organization for the various trades reveals all
involved parties have created a relationship conducive to
avoiding and resolving work jurisdictional disputes in a fairly
effective manner largely without disrupting work performed
at Hanford. Thus, it is reasonable to conclude here that
permitting severance of the carpenters and millwrights from
the existing unit would be destabilizing to the involved
parties and their many decades of a predominantly stable bar-
gaining relationship.
Based on the above and the record as a whole, I find
the history of collective bargaining weighs against Petitioner
meeting its heavy burden of demonstrating craft severance is
appropriate in the circumstances of this case.
3. Separate Identity
The facts in regard to separate identity in this case are
similar to those present in Kaiser Foundation, 312 NLRB at
936, where the Board found that the unit had not maintained
a separate identity given that terms and conditions of em-
ployment, including hours of work, holidays, health and
pension benefits, vacation, seniority, and leave were uniform-
ly applied across the unit.
As with previous factors, the strongest argument that
carpenters and millwrights have in support of maintaining a
separate identity is the preservation of their exclusive, albeit
separate work jurisdictions. However, Petitioner again faces
the problem that this argument equally demonstrates the
separate identity the carpenters and millwrights have largely
maintained from each other over the past 50 years at PNNL.
DECISIONS OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD14
With the exception of their history of joint and limited rep-
resentation by Petitioner, including carpenters and mill-
wrights paying dues to Petitioner, nothing binds the carpenters
and millwrights together that does not also largely apply to the
remaining portion of the existing unit.
Specifically, carpenters and millwrights have different
wage rates and perform different work. Accordingly, when
Petitioner asserts that carpenters and millwrights are proper-
ly placed together in the petitioned-for unit, it is presumably
relying on commonalities such as shared insurance and re-
tirement benefits, vacation and holidays, working hours and
shift schedules, and being subject to the same work rules.
However, these shared commonalities are equally shared by
the remaining employees in the existing unit with the peti-
tioned-for group.
As would perhaps be expected in a workplace where most
work is performed within exclusive jurisdictions, transfers
between crafts are not common, supporting Petitioner’s posi-
tion. However, I note that other factors, such as joint su-
pervision on functionally integrated multi-craft teams weigh
against the Petitioner’s argument on this factor.
Indeed, the record reveals that the Employer’s recognition
of exclusive jurisdictions is the functional limit of the separate
identities maintained by the trades at PNNL. In sum, the rec-
ord reveals that this factor does not support the Petitioner’s posi-
tion.
4. Degree of Integration of the Employer’s
Production Processes
The Employer’s multi-craft work teams present a signifi-
cant opportunity for integrated work while still respecting
jurisdictional lines. The examples in the record, from door
installation to fire inspections reveal much of the mainte-
nance department’s work involves multi-step projects requir-
ing multiple crafts. This is clearly reflected in the Employer’s
organization of the multi-craft work teams. Such an organiza-
tional structure is only efficient and effective apparently
over all these years if the multi-craft teams are actually
performing a large number of tasks that require more than one
craft. Indeed, the record supports this conclusion. Multiple
employees testified that they work in conjunction with other
trades on a daily basis, and the Employer and HAMTC
maintain the Craft Alignment Program. Further, the record
reveals some un-quantified but regular temporary transfers of
craft employees between the multi-craft teams based on work
or need. Thus, the record establishes the work of existing
unit employees is functionally integrated to a relatively high
degree.
Based on the foregoing and the record as a whole, I find the
employer’s organization of integrated multi-craft work teams
performing tasks requiring multiple crafts under shared super-
vision, does not support Petitioner’s position that craft severance
isappropriate.
5. Qualifications of the Union Seeking
Severance
Petitioner has extensive experience with the employees in
the petitioned-for unit as an affiliate union in HAMTC, and
Petitioner’s parent organizations have extensive experience
representing maintenance units in general. Intervenor argues
that this factor does not support Petitioner’s argument because
it has never represented the petitioned-for employees as an
exclusive collective bargaining representative. I do not find
Intervenor’s argument persuasive. First, this cannot be the
standard applied to qualification, for if Petitioner was the
exclusive collective bargaining representative, it would not
need to file the instant petition. Second, the experience Peti-
tioner has in representing the carpenters and millwrights, con-
ducting regular meetings, electing officers, managing dues,
and representing its member crafts in jurisdictional disputes
and Appendix A bargaining, are sufficient qualifications to
represent the carpenters and millwrights at PNNL.
In view of the above and the record as a whole, I find this
factor favors Petitioner’s position.
6. The History and Pattern of Collective-bargaining in the
Industry
The record reveals that the Employer is involved in a
unique industry, and other Department of Energy laborato-
ries provide the best comparisons. At these laboratory facil-
ities, metal trade councils represent a single maintenance
bargaining unit. Petitioner asserts, in attempting to distin-
guish these facilities, that PNNL performs less defense
industry research than other Department of Energy facilities
or laboratories. However, Petitioner did not submit evidence
to support this assertion, as the record contains scant evi-
dence of the work performed at PNNL, and only a brief sum-
mary of the work performed at the other comparator laborato-
ries.
As for Petitioner’s attempt to distinguish the substance of
these comparable laboratories’ collective bargaining agree-
ments, I do not find this convincing with regard to this factor.
Clearly the collective bargaining agreements from other compa-
rable laboratories differ in some ways from the HAMTC
agreements. However, the question posed by Mallinckrodt
is instead the pattern of collective bargaining in the indus-
try, and Petitioner provides no case support for the proposi-
tion this factor turns on the precise terms and conditions
set forth in other proffered labor agreements. Petitioner’s
argument is also inconsistent, as it faults Intervenor’s labor
agreement comparison on a substantive basis, but then offers a
comparison, the Washington State Ferry system’s labor agree-
ment, which similarly includes many substantive differences in
terms and conditions of employment from the HAMTC agree-
ments.
Petitioner further argues the Washington State Ferry sys-
tem is the proper industry for comparison, on the basis that
carpenters in a production and maintenance unit at that facili-
ty, previously bargaining as part of a metal trades council,
split from the council and have now bargained two contract
cycles independently. Petitioner asserts the comparison is apt
because a public ferry system has a vested interest in labor
peace and because the unit performs maintenance work at
multiple locations. I do not find these arguments persuasive
relative to the evidence and arguments offered by HAMTC.
BATTELLE MEMORIAL INSTITUTE 15
On the basis of the foregoing and the record as a whole, I
find that this factor does not favor Petitioner’s position in this
case.
C. CONCLUSIONREGARDINGCRAFT
SEVERANCE
Having examined the six Mallinckrodt factors in turn, I
find that all but one weigh against Petitioner meeting its
heavy burden of demonstrating craft severance is appropriate in
the circumstances of this case. Consistent with Mallinck-
rodt, Kaiser Foundation, and Metropolitan Opera, I further
find that Petitioner has failed to demonstrate compelling cir-
cumstances that would necessitate disturbing a bargaining
unit where there has been a 50-year history of continuous, sta-
ble, and productive bargaining.
I recognize that I am reaching a different conclusion here
than that reached by the Regional Director in Electric Boat
Corp., 01–RC–124746, addressed by both Petitioner and
Intervenor. In that case, the Regional Director granted sev-
erance to carpenters and millwrights from a larger production
and maintenance unit in a shipyard setting. Here, the facts
presented are significantly different, including, critically, that
in Electric Boat the two crafts in question were in a separate
department and were separately supervised. Further, the stable,
long, and productive bargaining history here is different from
the history present in Electrical Boat Corp. In sum, the deci-
sion in Case 01–RC–124746 is not binding on me in the instant
case. Moreover, Case 01–RC–124746 is before the Board and,
therefore, has no precedential value. See Boeing Co., 337
NLRB 152, 153, fn. 4 (2001).
IV. DECISION
In the sections above, I have set forth the record evi-
dence and an analysis of that evidence relative to the
Board’s Mallinckrodt standard that is applicable in cases
of this nature. After analyzing the six factors constituting
the Mallinckrodt standard, I find that the unit sought by Peti-
tioner cannot be severed out of the existing unit as a separate
craft unit, because only ·one of six factors supports Peti-
tioner. Accordingly, I find that the existing Employer-wide
maintenance unit is the unit appropriate for bargaining. How-
ever, Petitioner has declined to go forward to an election in
any unit other than the petitioned-for unit. Thus, Ishall order
dismissal of the instant petition.
V. ORDER
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the · petition filed herein
be, and it hereby is, dismissed.