General Box Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Mar 14, 1951

93 N.L.R.B. 789 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

GENERAL BOX COMPANY 789
GENERAL Box COMPANY and GENERAL DRIVERS, WAREHOUSEMEN, &
HELPERS LOCAL No. 89, INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS,
CHAUFFEURS , WAREHOUSEMEN AND HELPERS OF AMERICA, AFL,
PETITIONER . Case No. 9{-RC-104. March 14, 1951
Decision and Direction of Election
Upon a petition duly filed, a hearing was held before George A.
Leet, hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hear-
ing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.'
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the National Labor
Relations Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connection with
this case to a three-member panel [Chairman Herzog and Members
Murdock and Styles].
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the National Labor Relations Act.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent certain em-
ployees of the Employer.2
3. The Employer and the Intervenor assert that their current con-
tract bars the petition filed herein. The present agreement between
the parties was executed on May 26, 1950, for a term of 1 year with
provision for automatic renewal in the absence of 60 days' prior writ-
ten notice of intent to terminate or amend. As the Mill B date of this
contract will occur less than 30 days from the date of this decision,
the Board finds that the current agreement does not constitute a bar
to this proceeding.3 Accordingly, the Board finds that a question
affecting commerce exists concerning the representation of employees
of the Employer within the meaning of Section 9 (c) and Section
2 (6) and (7) of the Act.
4. The Petitioner requests a unit consisting of all truck drivers
and helpers at both the Employer's box plants at Louisville, Ken-
tucky, excluding supervisors and all other employees. The Employer
and the Intervenor oppose severance of the truck drivers from the
existing production and maintenance unit and contend the requested
unit is inappropriate.
a The Intervenor moved at the hearing to dismiss the petition on the ground it was
barred by the Intervenor 's contract with the Employer and that it requested an inappro-
priate unit . The motion to dismiss , referred to the Board by the hearing officer , is denied
for reasons hereinafter stated under paragraphs numbered 3 and 4.
2 United Paperworkers of America , CIO, Local 1055, ( hereinafter termed the Intervenor,
was granted intervention at the hearing by the hearing officer on the ground of a con-
tractual interest in the representation of these employees
8 See Dictaphone Corporation, 90 NLRB 962 .E In view of this finding , the Board will
not determine the issue as to whether the union -security provisions of the contract are
authorized by the Act.
93 NLRB No. 126.
790 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Since 1937 collective bargaining at the Employer's plants has been
conducted in a unit of all production and maintenance employees.
With the exception of the period between 1947 and 1949, the Em-
ployer's truck drivers have been included in the bargaining unit and
in the contracts negotiated by the Employer and the Intervenor.4 At
the present time there are 11 employees in the classification of truck
driver at the Employer's plants. Of these employees, 3 are assigned
to delivery of materials and products between plants and within the
city area while the remaining 8 drivers operate tractor-trailer units
between Louisville and points such as Kansas City, Chicago, and
Evansville, Indiana. The Employer has no employees in the classi-
fication of helpers, and all maintenance work on its trucks is done at
outside garages. The drivers are under the supervision of the traffic
manager who directs all shipment of goods to and from the Louis-
ville plants and who also supervises the shipping and receiving
crews assigned to loading and unloading of trucks and freight cars.
Three shift foremen also supervise the drivers and the shipping and
receiving crews.
Both the city delivery drivers and the over-the-road drivers spend
the majority of their working time away from the plant. On occa-
sions when bad weather prevents trucking activity, the drivers are
used in the plant on shipping gangs or as operators of fork lift trucks
to avoid layoffs. These occasions, however, are infrequent and re-
stricted to cases in which the employees have not completed a full
workweek before driving was curtailed. While seniority is plant
wide, there is little interchange between the drivers and the re-
mainder of the plant personnel and new drivers are generally hired
from applicants outside the plant force with previous driving experi-
ence . While employee facilities, vacations, holidays, and other con-
tract "fringe" benefits are the same for all employees at the plants, the
truck drivers' hours and wages differ in some respects from those of
the rest of the plant .5
The Employer and the Intervenor contend the petition should be
dismissed on the ground the truck drivers are a constituent part of the
over-all production and maintenance unit. Although the truck
drivers herein share the same supervision as the•shipping and receiv-
ing crews, help the latter in loading and unloading of the trucks, and
may, on infrequent occasions, work within the plant, the record shows
that the duties of the drivers are materially distinct from those of
4 For a 2-year period, the Employer used outside trucking facilities exclusively and
employed no drivers.
6 Over-the -road drivers average from 45 to 50 hours a week and may work up to 60
hours. City drivers average 45 hours a week while production and maintenance employees
work between 40 and 45 hours each week . All employees are paid hourly but the pro-
duction and maintenance employees and the over -the-road drivers have separate incentive
bonus systems , and the city drivers have no incentive bonus plan.
SILVER KNIT HOSIERY MILLS, INC- 791
other plant employees. On similar facts, the Board has frequently
held that truck drivers constitute a separate and identifiable group of
skilled employees entitled to separate bargaining despite a history of
inclusion in a broader collective bargaining unit.' Under these cir-
cumstances, and on the basis of the entire record, we find that the
Employer's truck drivers may appropriately be included in the pro-
duction and maintenance unit or in a separate unit. We shall, there-
fore, order an election in a voting group consisting of all truck drivers
and helpers at the Employer's Louisville box plants, excluding
supervisors and all other employees.
The Board, however, shall make no final unit determination at
this time, but shall first ascertain the desires of those employees as
expressed in the election hereinafter directed. If a majority vote
for the Petitioner, they will be taken to have indicated their desire to
constitute a separate unit. If not, they will be taken to have indicated
their desire to remain a part of the existing production and mainfenace
unit.
• [Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this
volume.]
9 See Detroit Branch, Reliance Steel Division, Detroit Steel Corporation, 90 NLRB No.
62; The Schaible Company, 88 NLRB 733 and cases cited therein.
SILVER KNIT HOSIERY MILLS, INC. and UNITED TEXTILE WORKERS OF
AMERICA, AFL, PETITIONER. Case No. 34-RC-245. March 14, 1951
Decision and Direction of Election
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor
Relations Act, a hearing was held before Miles J. McCormick, hearing
officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free
from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.,
' At the bearing the Petitioner objected to the intervention of American Federation of
Hosiery Workers, the Intervenor in this proceeding, on the ground that the Intervenor
had made no showing of interest in the matter The hearing officer properly overruled
the objection and permitted the intervention It is well settled that the sufficiency of a
showing of interest is an administrative matter for determination by the Board and is
not subject to collateral attack R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, 88 NLRB 600, and
cases cited therein.
The record shows that immediately prior to the opening of the hearing, the Petitioner
and the Employer agreed to enter into a stipulation as to the appropriateness of the unit
proposed by the Petitioner, and to execute a consent election agreement. The Intervenor
refused to join in this agreement. The hearing officer rejected the consent agreement
on the ground that in his opinion the unit agreed upon was inappropriate. The Peti-
tioner excepts to the hearing officer's ruling. Whether or not the hearing officer had
authority to disapprove the consent election agreement on the ground of the inappropriate-
ness of the proposed unit, it is clear that approval of such agreement was precluded in
any event by the unwillingness of the Intervenor to join therein. Accordingly, the hearing
officer's action was not prejudicial to the Petitioner, and is hereby affirmed.
93 NLRB No. 120.