( Express and Station Employes PARTIES TO DISPUTE:

STATEMENT OF CLAIM: Claim of the System Committee of the Brotherhood

1. Carrier violated the Agreement between the parties when it failed and refused to allow moving expenses as submitted by agent/telegrapher, R. J. Denevan, on August 2, 1976.

 2. Carrier shall now be required to compensate Mr. R. J. Denevan $676.45 in line with Article RIV and RVI of the December 1, 1,969 Agreement.

 OPINION OF BOARD: In accordance with the so-called Centralization
 Agreement (which became effective in early 1971), the Carrier, on April 16, 1973, established a Central Agency Complex headquartered at Crystal City, Missouri and incorporating eight stations, including Barnhart, to the north of Crystal City. The claimant had been the Agent/Telegrapher at Barnhart. Rather than take a separation allowance, the claimant transferred to Crystal City and there became an Assistant Agent. In making the move, he (and others similarly situated) received the benefits - protection against loss of wages, reimbursement for moving expenses, etc. - of Article %VI of the Agreement of December 1, 1969.

 In May, 1976, the claimant's crystal City position was abolished. Exercising his seniority, the claimant displaced a junior employe in the position of Operator Cashier No. 4 (also referred to in the record as the Telegrapher Position No. 4) at Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Cape Girardeau lies some 100 miles to the south of Crystal City. The claimant assumed his new post in early June, 1976. He moved his family and personal belongings about a month later.


Thereafter, on August 2, 1976, the claimant filed a claim for reimbursement of various moving expenses and for 5 days' pay at his former Crystal City rate. His claim came to a total of $974.25. The Organization subsequently amended the claim (withdrawing, among other things, the reque Thus yielded is the $676.45 sum which is specified in the Statement of Claim.

 The Carrier interposes a time-limit objection based an the elapsed time between the claimant's assumption of the Cape Girardeau post and the Superintendent's receipt of the claimant's moving-expenses-and-wage-loss statement. Given our conclusion on the merits, we see no need to show the exact nature of the timelimit objection or to deal with that well founded.

 On the merits, the question is whether the claimant is entitled to the claimed $676.45 by combined effect of Article XIV and Article XVI of the December 1, 1969 Agreement.

 Article XIV is titled "Implementing Agreements". Its Section 1 reds as follows:



                  Docket Number CL-22221


Article %VI is titled "Moving Expenses and Separation Allowances". It contains the following provisions.

        Section 1(a) reads:


        "In the case of any transfer or rearrangement of forces as a result of a technological, operational or organizational change for which an implementing agreement has been made, any protected employe who is requested by the Carrier pursuant to said implementing agreement to transfer to a new point of employment requiring a change of residence shall be given an election which must be exercised in writing within 7 calendar days of the date of such request:


        (1) To transfer in accordance with provisions

        of the implementing agreement; or,

        (2) To exercise seniority displacement rights."


          Section 1(e) reads:


        "If the employe elects to exercise seniority displacement rights in lieu of transfer in accordance with provisions of the implementing agreement, or if he reverts to the extra list as a result of his failure to exercise an option, he shall not be entitled to the benefits provided by this Article %VI."


        Section 2(a) reads:


        "In all instances in which the Carrier makes a technological, operational or organizational change which does not require an implementing agreement under Section 1 above, but which results in an employe having to change his place of residence in order to retain his protected status, such employe shall be reimbursed for:


          (1) The actual cost of moving his household goods and personal effects, including necessary packing and unpacking and standard insurance provided by the common carrier as a part of the basic rate;

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                  Docket Number CL-22221


          "(2) Actual wage loss during the time necessary for such transfer; not to exceed fiver working days;


          (3) Automobile mileage by the most direct highway route not to exceed one and one-half round trips from his.old residence to his new residence;


          (4) Actual necessary living expenses for himself and his family during the time necessary for such transfer, not to exceed five days."


Contrary to what the Organization is contending, we believe that we must view the dual event which is here fundaWentally at issue - the abolition of the claimant's Crystal City position and the consequent exercise of his seniority rights - as falling outside the kind of situation which triggers the protective benefits of Article XVI. It is MU'e that the phrase "technological, operational and organizational changes"x stands without definiti of a position can be taken to constitute one or another of such changes. But so to proceed, in our opinion, would be contrary to the scheme of the clearly manifested by the provisions. We do not ~-to Lay down any sort of broadly-applicable definition of the phrase, but we think it is clear that the reference is to changes which bring into play realignments and their attendant transfers of duties, positions sad employes. This is what happened when the Central Agency Complex at Crystal City was established - and when, accordingly, the claimant and others became entitled to the protective benefits. It cannot be held that this is what happened in the present case. The record is bare of any evidence, or even the slightest. suggestion, that there was any relationship - save for the exercise of the claimant's seniority rights - between what happened at. Crystal City and what happened at Cape Girardeau. All that can be taken to have happened is that the claimant's position was abolished - an event which marks a reduction in force - and that the claimant, in exercising his seniority rights, displaced a junior employe at Cape Girardeau. The claimant landed at Cape Girardeau, some 100 miles away, but he did so because that is where

 * The connecting word "and" is used at Article XIV, whereas the connecting word used at Article XVI is "or". Viewing the difference as attributable to context, we a
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                  Docket Number CL-22221


his seniority took him.

 The record includes references to correspondence between the parties in 1975 on whether or not the Carrier could reduce the Crystal City force below a certain level without an implementing agreement. The correspondence ended in a stalemate. On the assumption that no implementing agreement was necessary, the Organization submits that, while Section 1 of Article %VI might be rendered inoperative, Section 2 of that Article remains in the picture and entitles the claimant to its benefits. We see it differently. We believe that the occurrence of "technological, operational or organizational changes" remains as the underlying requisite condition.

 Other arguments and sub-arguments are in the record. We refrain from dealing with them because we have given what we believe to be the answer which is central and dispositive of all that is before us. We note that, in declining to view the present situation as one which falls within the purview of "technological, operational or organizational changes", we are in accord with a series of Special Adjustment Board holdings (involving different properties but substantially the same language).

        FINDINGS: The Third Division of the Adjustment Board, upon the whole record and all the evidence, finds and holds:


        That the parties waived oral hearing;


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

        That the Agreement was not violated.

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                  Docket Number CL-22221

                  A W A R D


        Claim denied.


                        NATIONAL RAILROAD ADJUS1'

                        By Order of Third D*visf=


ATfE~_: : '' . - t`
 Executive Secretary

 Date& at Chicago, Illinois, this 31st day of July lM.
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