Kaiser-Frazer Corp.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Mar 22, 1951

93 N.L.R.B. 892 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

892 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
KAISER-FRAZER CORPORATION and JOHN A. RIOPELLE , PETITIONER and
LOCAL 142 , INTERNATIONAL UNION, UNITED AUTOMOBILE , AIRCRAFT
AND AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENT WORKERS OF AMERICA, UAW-CIO
KAISER-FRAZER CORPORATION and S. R. HARRISON , PETITIONER and
LOCAL 142, INTERNATIONAL UNION , UNITED AUTOMOBILE , AIRCRAFT
AND AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENT WORKERS OF AMERICA, UAW-CIO.
Cases Nos. 7-RD-9O and 7-RD-95. March 2 ,1951
Decision and Order
Upon petitions for decertification duly filed, a consolidated hearing
in these cases was held before W. A. Reinke, hearing officer. The
hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing 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
Houston and Reynolds].
Upon the entire record in these cases, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the National Labor Relations Act.
2. The Petitioners, employees of the Employer, assert that the Union
is no longer the representative of the employees designated in the
petitions as defined in Section 9 -(a) of the Act.
The Union, a labor organization, is the currently recognized repre-
sentative of the Employer's employees.
.
3. No question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa-
tion of employees of the Employer within the meaning of Section
9 (c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act, for the following
reasons:
The Petitioner in Case No. 7-RD-90 seeks to have the Union decer-
tified for a unit consisting of employees classified as experimental or
project engineers.' The Petitioner in Case No. 7-RD-95 seeks to have
the Union decertified for a unit of employees classified as electrical
experimental or project engineers? The employees in both cases work
at the Employer's Willow Run, Michigan, plant. The Petitioners
in each case assert that the employees involved are professional em-
ployees who should not be included in the existing unit of engineers
and technicians without a separate election to determine whether or
not they desire to be so included. The Union urges that the petitions
in these cases should be dismissed on the grounds (1) that the em-
I Approximately 16 employees are involved in this case.
2 Approximately six employees are involved in this case.
93 NLRB No. 146.
KAISER-FRAZER CORPORATION 893
ployees sought to be decertified are not professional employees and
(2) that the units described are inappropriate. The Employer is
neutral.
On January 6, 1947, after a period of negotiations between the Em-
ployer and the Union, recognition agreements were executed for two
separate units of the Employer's employees, in one of which were
included all the Employer's engineers and technical employees, ex-
cluding managerial and supervisory personnel and "employees whose
work is of a confidential nature." The employees involved in these
cases were deemed at that time to be confidential employees and there-
fore excluded from the engineering and technical unit in which they
would otherwise have been included.3 During the negotiations for a
new contract which was signed on September 19, 1950, the exclusion
of these employees on the ground that they were confidential employees
was reexamined. It was then agreed by both parties that under Board
precedents they were not confidential employees and that they should
be included in the unit of the Employer's engineering and technical
employees 4
The employees involved in these cases work in three departments
of the automotive engineering division. Those classified as project
engineers-electrical are employed in the electrical engineering depart-
ment, and the project engineers-experimental are employed in the
engine and chassis and body engineering departments. Both groups
work in the experimental or spare parts building at the Employer's
plant. As individuals they are assigned projects based on work
orders which originate in the various divisions of the engineering de=
partment, requiring research to determine the cause of failure of auto-
motive parts, or to promote their development and improvement.
Employees in both groups contact the Employer's vendors of parts to
examine and review specifications for parts. They also review and
edit the Employer's service publications and bulletins. These tasks
require advanced academic training in engineering or a long prac-
tical experience, and involve the exercise of much judgment and dis-
cretion. Upon completion of the research assignments, the project
engineers make out reports which are forwarded through their section
supervisor to the section which initiated the specific project.
8 These employees were also excluded for the same reason from participation in union-
security elections held in 1949, under Section 9 (e) (1) of the Act.
4 None of the parties in Case No. 7-RD-90 asserts that the contract is a bar to the
proceedings as the petition in that case was filed on August 7, 1950, before the execution
of the contract . The Union , however, asserts that the contract is a bar to the direction
of an election in Case No. 7-RD-95, because no formal petition was filed in that case
until after the contract was signed . As to the latter case, the record shows that a docu-
ment, apparently intended either as a petition or as a showing of interest in support of a
petition, was filed in the Regional Office on August 8, 1950 The formal petition, however,
was not filed until September 29, 1950. In view of the Board's determination of the
unit issue , it is unnecessary to pass upon the question of contract bar thus arising.
894 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
The record discloses that there are other employees classified as
project engineers, also employed within the automotive engineering
division although not in the experimental building, who are not
sought to be included in these proceedings. Likewise, there are many
other engineers of different classifications, not only in automotive
engineering but also in the plant engineering and master mechanic
divisions,5 within approximately the same salary grades, apparently
possessing the same qualifications of education and experience as the
project engineers involved in these proceedings, and who have been
included in the engineering and technical unit since it was established.
The Petitioners' contention, in substance, is that as the employees
here involved are professional employees, each of the two groups is
entitled to a separate election to determine whether the Employer and
the Union may rightfully include them in the existing engineering
and technical unit which also contains some nonprofessional em-
ployees. In support of this contention, the Petitioners rely on that
portion of Section 9 (b) of the Act which provides that ... the
Board shall not- ... decide that any unit is appropriate ... if such
unit includes both professional employees and employees who are not
professional employees unless a majority of such professional em-
ployees vote for inclusion in such unit, . . ." In consonance with the
principle of separate representation thus expressed, and in recognition
of the different interests arising from professional status, the Board
has directed decertification electipns among units of professional em-
ployees to afford them an opportunity for severance from broader
units containing other types of employee classifications.s
In general, however, the Board will not conduct a severance election
among a group which does not include all the same or similar classifi-
cations within the unit from which severance by decertification is
sought.' In the present case, it is not necessary to consider the ap-
propriateness of the broader unit in which these employees are now
included, for no determination of representatives is sought in such a
unit. Nor is it necessary to determine whether the employees for
whom these petitions are filed are professional employees. For it is
evident that, in any event, they are no more than a segment of a larger
group possessing like qualifications and performing similar types of
duties, included within the existing unit. As the proposed units fail
to include all employees with similar status and similar interests, the
Board finds that the units are inappropriate for the purpose of these
5 Approximately 17 engineers work in the plant or manufacturing engineering division
.and 48 in the master mechanic engineering division.
6 Kelsey Hayes Wheel Company, 85 NLRB 666
7 Stanolhnd Ott & Gas Research Section, 81 NLRB 1089.
THE WICHITA WATER COMPANY 895 -
decertification proceedings.8 We shall therefore dismiss these peti-
tions.
Order
IT Is HEREBY ORDERED that the petition in these consolidated cases
be, and they hereby are, dismissed.
8 General Motors Corporation, Buick Motors Division, 92 NLRB 240 ; Douglas Aircraft
Company, Inc., 92 NLRB 702 (to which Chairman Herzog and Member Houston dis-
sented, but by which they now consider themselves bound).
THE WICHITA WATER COMPANY and CONGRESS OF INDUSTRIAL ORGAN-
IZATIONS, PETITIONER. Case No. 17-RC-910 . March 22, 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 William J. Cassidy, hearing
officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free
from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the Act, the Board
has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-mem-
ber panel [Chairman Herzog and Members Houston and Reynolds].
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the Act.
2. The labor organization involved claims to represent certain em-
ployees of the Employer.
3. A question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa-
tion of employees of the Employer within the meaning of Section 9
(c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act.
4. The appropriate unit :
The Petitioner seeks to represent all employees in the Employer's
service, or distribution, department, excluding guards, office clerical
and professional employees, and supervisors as defined in the Act.
The Employer asserts that the proposed unit is inappropriate unless
it includes the Employer's pumping station employees. The parties
also disagree as to the proper classification of 15 persons in the dis-
tribution department, some of whom the Petitioner would exclude
from the unit as supervisors, and others of whom it would exclude
as clerical employees.
The Employer sells and distributes water to commercial and residen-
tial users in Wichita, Kansas. Its "production" activities occur in
93 NLRB No. 143.