REPRESENTATION ISSUES; UNIT MODIFICATION – Accretion, Adding classification(s) to existing unit (transit district units)

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1310.00000 – REPRESENTATION ISSUES; UNIT MODIFICATION
1310.08000 – Accretion, Adding classification(s) to existing unit (transit district units)

Under California public transit district law, accretions are restricted to a lesser degree than the National Labor Relations Act, but more so than under California’s non-transit public sector relations acts. The following factors must be considered when determining whether to accrete employees to an existing Public Utilities Code transit district bargaining unit: whether the new group of employees itself constitutes an appropriate unit; the size of the group to be accreted relative to the size of the existing unit; whether the group to be accreted was already in existence at the time the existing bargaining unit was recognized; the extent to which the existing unit is itself the result of prior accretions; and the views of the employees. Additionally, as in any case involving a unit determination, the Board examines the traditional community of interest factors to determine whether the proposed transit unit is appropriate. These include: bargaining history; desires of the affected employees; nature of the employer’s business; similarity in scale and manner of determining earnings; similarity in employment benefits, hours of work, and other terms and conditions of employment; similarity in the kind of work performed; similarity in the qualifications, skills, and training of the affected employees; frequency of contact or interchange among the employees; geographical proximity; continuity or integration of production processes; common supervision and determination of labor-relations policy; and relationship to the employer’s administrative organization, as well as “the employer’s authority to bargain effectively at the level of the unit and the effect of a unit on the efficient operation of the public service. While most of these factors are also relevant to one degree or another under federal law, California public transit district law does not restrict accretions to the same extent as does the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in applying federal law.