The Third Division of the Adjustment Board, upon the whole record and all the evidence, finds that:
The carrier or carriers and the employee or employees involved in this dispute are respectively carrier and employee within the meaning of the Railway Labor Act, as approved June 21,1934.
This Division of the Adjustment Board has jurisdiction over the dispute involved herein.
Procedural objections to the Board's jurisdiction over this matter raised by the Carrier are dismissed for reasons set forth in Fourth Division Awards 5074, 5075 and 5076.
Turning to the merits, the facts are not in material dispute. Prior to the claim dates, the Carrier maintained fully-stocked storehouses at its facilities at Duluth and Twin Harbors, Minnesota. Claimants C. L. Gagne at the Duluth Ore Docks and M. T. Ward at Two Harbors, Agreement-covered employees in the position of Warehouse Foreman, were regularly assigned at those warehouses to perform the work of ordering, receiving, unpacking, stocking, inventorying and distributing various material, i.e., pillow blocks, bearings, adapters, end plates, end plate seals, and triple seals, to maintenance crews. Some time prior to the claim dates, the Carrier entered into a "Vendor Stocking" arrangement with Bearing Headquarters for "as-needed/just-in-time" delivery of such materials, with the expressed goal of eventually achieving "zero-balance for DMIR inventory." Form 1 Award No. 36714
As part of the phase-in to this new "zero-balance" Vendor Stocking arrangement with Bearing Headquarters, commencing March 23, 1999, the Carrier allowed the outside vendor to collect items and materials the Carrier had on hand in its inventory in the warehouses staffed by the Claimants and remove said Carrierowned materials to warehouses maintained by Bearing Headquarters, where Bearing Headquarters' employees thereafter performed the work of securing, storing and distributing those Carrier-owned items. In that connection, the following assertions in the initial claim letter were never effectively refuted by the Carrier on the property:
In our considered judgment the Carrier's unilateral removal from regular performance by the Claimants of the work they formerly performed on these very materials (pillow blocks, bearings, adapters, end plates, end plate seals, and triple seals) in the Carrier's storehouses and reassigning that work on those materials to the employees of the outside vendor was a patent violation of Rule 1 of the Agreement. See Third Division Award 33044, Public Law Board No. 4848, Award 23 and Public Law Board No. 4596, Award 3. As the Board and virtually every other competent arbitral tribunal which has considered the issue has held, the Carrier's defense of "exclusivity" is of no avail under a "positions and work" Scope Rule. See Third Division Awards 33148 and 29401; see especially Public Law Board No. 5554, Awards 2 and 10 (involving the same Parties and identical language in the Ore Dock Agreement). Form 1 Award No. 36714
Based on the facts of record and the plain language of Rule 1, the claim is sustained for one call per day to be divided equally between the Claimants for the period of time commencing March 23, 1999 and continuing until such time as the Agreement-covered work of securing, storing and distributing the Carrier-owned pillow blocks, bearings, adapters, end plates, end plate seals, and triple seals is restored to performance by the Claimants; or all such time as those previously purchased items and materials removed from the Carrier's storehouses and relocated to Bearing Headquarters has been drawn down to a "zero-balance."
This Board, after consideration of the dispute identified above, hereby orders that an award favorable to the Claimant(s) be made. The Carrier is ordered to make the Award effective on or before 30 days following the postmark date the Award is transmitted to the parties.