(a) The Carrier violated the current Signalmen's Agreement, as amended, particularly the Scope, Rule 1, when it allowed the General Railway Signal Company to do the fitting up and wiring of relay cases A and B and bungalows Nos. 1, 2 and 3 for the automatic interlocking installation at 15th Street, Tacoma, Washington, on the Tacoma Division.
(b) The Carrier be required to pay the employes listed below and any qualified Signalman, Foreman or Inspector unintentionally omitted from the list in equal and proportionate shares, at their respective pro rata rates of pay, the amount of time which has been estimated was required to perform this work-or a total of eight hundred and twenty-five (825) hours. The named Claimants are as follows:
EMPLOYES' STATEMENT OF FACTS: On April 12, 1962, the Carrier put an NX interlocking plant in service at Tacoma, Washington. This modern facility replaced the mechanical interlocking plant at 15th Street and provided other interlocking facilities elsewhere in the vicinity of its depot yard at Tacoma. An Order from the ICC, dated April 12, 1962, which describes the installation, is reproduced as Brotherhood's Exhibit No. 1.
The Carrier contracted out or otherwise allowed the General Railway Signal Company to do the fitting up and wiring of relay cases A and B, bungalow Nos. 1, 2 and 3 and the apparatus and relay racks for the control tower.
Cases A and B and bungalows 1, 2 and 3 were received from the signal company with almost all of the equipment installed and they were wired. Only the relays were not mounted, but the nametags had been stencilled on them at the factory.
The racks for the control tower were received with all equipment mounted except for the transformers and heavy rectifiers. The track rectifiers were factory mounted. All B relay plugboards were mounted with only the relay retaining bolts left off. The relay racks were completely wired from the relays to a termination block at the top of each. The apparatus racks were received with all inter-rack wires run and terminated. All inter-rack connections had been made up into two harnesses ready to install in order to connect the entrance rack, apparatus racks, relay rack and application relay racks together. Rack Nos. 2 and 3 are the application relay racks, and they were completely wired, but the A type relays were not installed. Photographs have been reproduced, and are included as Brotherhood's Exhibit Nos. 2, 3 and 4. Brief descriptions are shown on each exhibit which identify them as bungalow 1, bungalow 2, and control tower racks.
Inasmuch as the Scope of the effective Signalmen's Agreement specifically provides for "the construction, installation, maintenance and repair of * * * interlocking plants * * * relay housing and wiring; and appurtenances", Local Chairman C. Gower made claim on behalf of certain named and unnamed employes on the Western District for eight hundred and twenty-five (825) man hours to Mr. F. V. Sloop, Assistant Signal Engineer, under date of May 17, 1962. Mr. Gower's letter of May 17, 1962, is Brotherhood's Exhibit No. 5.
On July 9, 1962, the assistant signal engineer addressed a letter to the local chairman in which he denied the claim. (Brotherhood's Exhibit No. 6.)
A. B. Snook was assigned to an hourly rated position of signal maintainer, working from 7:00 A. M. to 4:00 P. M. Monday through Friday, with headquarters at Fremont, Washington.
A. C. Peterson was assigned to an hourly rated position of signal maintainer, working from 7:00 A. M. to 4:00 P. M. Monday through Friday, with headquarters at Puyallup, Washington.
W. R. Carnes was assigned to an hourly rated position of signal maintainer, working from 7:00 A. M. to 4:00 P. M. Monday through Friday, with headquarters at Tacoma, Washington.
J. T. Keough was assigned to a monthly rated position of signal inspector, the assigned territory of this position being the Idaho Division, with headquarters at Spokane, Washington.
G. L. Flagon was assigned to a monthly rated position of signal inspector, the assigned territory of this position being the Tacoma Division, with headquarters at Tacoma, Washington.
No employs who had acquired seniority as signal foreman, signalman or signal inspector was out of service on account of force reduction.
Rule 1 of the current agreement, effective April 16, 1950, as revised effective October 1, 1956, between the Northern Pacific Railway and Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen reads:
Rule 1. This agreement governs the rates of pay, hours of service and working conditions of employes specified herein, engaged in the construction, installation, maintenance and repair of signals, signal power lines, pole line signal circuits, interlocking plants, mechanical switches and locking mechanism for spring switches in signalled territory, electrically operated highway crossing protective devices, automatic crossing gates, wayside train stops and train control equipment, slide detector devices connected with signal systems, blower, gas, electric or other types of automatic snow removing equipment permanently located at switches in signalled territory, car retarder systems, centralized traffic control systems; relay housing and wiring; and appurtenances connected with such systems; signal shop work; and such other work as is generally recognized as signal work."
The claim presented in behalf of employes who have acquired seniority on the Western District under the April 16, 1950 Signalmen's Agreement has been declined.
OPINION OF BOARD: Carrier contends that Petitioner's claim must be dismissed for failure to comply with the provisions of Article V of the August 21, 1954 Agreement, namely, that the claim was not filed within 60 days "from the date of the occurrence on which the claim or grievance is based."
Carrier purchased an N% (entrance-exit) interlocking system from the General Railway Signal Company which included bungalows, relay cases
Lastly, we cannot accept Petitioner's theory that the right to file a claim came into being on the day the ICC approved Carrier's petition to put the new NX interlocking system into service. The claim, if any, came into being when it became known that Carrier allowed the General Railway Signal Company to do work which allegedly belonged to the Signalmen. That day, according to the record, was January 11, 1962. Even Petitioner acknowledges this by the wording of the claim which begins:
FINDINGS: The Third Division of the Adjustment Board, upon the whole record and all the evidence, finds and holds:
That the Carrier and the Employes involved in this dispute are respectively Carrier and Employes within the meaning of the Railway Labor Act, as approved June 21, 1934;
That this Division of the Adjustment Board has jurisdiction over the dispute involved herein; and