"Claim on behalf of the General Committee of the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen on the Alton and Southern:

Claim on behalf of G. M. Maxwell, J. L. Pratt and R. L. Pratt for 22 hours straight time and 1.5 hours time and one-half at their respective rates of pay, account Carrier violated the current Signalmen's Agreement, particularly the Scope Rule and Rule 802, when it used outside contractors to install AEI equipment on the Claimants' territory from January 16, 2004, through January 22, 2004, and deprived the Claimants of the opportunity to perform this work. This is a continuing claim because the installations were not complete at the time of the claims submission. Carrier's File No.

FINDINGS:

This Division of the Adjustment Board has jurisdiction over the dispute involved herein.

Parties to said dispute were given due notice of hearing thereon.

At the time that this dispute arose, Claimants G. M. Maxwell, J. L. Pratt and R. L. Pratt, who were assigned to various signal positions within the Signal Department.

The basic facts are not in dispute. On January 16, 20, 21, and 22, 2004, the Carrier allowed Comet Communications to install an Automatic Equipment Identification (AEI) system on the hump. The AEI system is a car tracking device activated by train movement. When a train passes over an AEI location, the device scans a bar code on each car, which identifies the car. This information is then transmitted via communications equipment from the AM location to the Carrier's Transportation Department. It is uncontested that the AEI system is a new system that has not been previously installed by Organization members.

The Organization claims that it was improper for the Carrier to contract out the above-mentioned work, which is contractually reserved to the Organization. The Organization further claims that this work is consistent with the Scope Rule. According to the Organization, the Carrier's BRS-represented employees were fully qualified and capable of performing the designated work. The work done by Comet Communications is within the jurisdiction of the Organization and, therefore, the Claimants should have performed said work. The Organization argues that because the Claimants were denied the opportunity to perform the relevant work, they should be compensated for the lost work opportunity.

Conversely, the Carrier takes the position that the Organization cannot meet its burden of proof in this matter. It contends that the work contracted out does not belong to BRS-represented employees under either the express language of the Scope Rule or any binding past practice. According to the Carrier, controlling precedent involving these very same parties and identical issues has upheld the Carrier's position.

Special Board of Adjustment No. 1016, Award 150 framed the scope issue as follows:

"In disputes of this kind, the threshold question for our analysis is that of scope coverage. There are generally two means of establishing scope coverage. The first is by citing language in the applicable scope rule that reserves the work in dispute to the Organization represented employees. The second method is required when the language of the scope rule is general. In that event, the Organization must shoulder the burden of proof to show that the employees it represents have customary, traditionally and historically performed the disputed work. It is well settled that exclusivity of past performance is not required in order to establish scope coverage vis-a-vis an outside contractor."

We carefully reviewed all evidence to ascertain whether the Organization proved that the work involved belongs to the Organization. We note that the work in question is new and has never been performed by BRS-represented employees. We note that the following language exists in the Scope Rule:

"All signals and signaling systems; traffic control systems; interlocking plants and interlocking systems . . . radio, microwave, radar, electrical and communications equipment and systems; train stop and train control systems;. . ."

As noted above, it is clear that the AEI system is new, and the work of installing such a system has not been previously performed by BRS-represented employees. Thus, the issue in this case is whether the work of installing the AEI system is covered by the Scope Rule. After a review of the record evidence, we cannot find that such work is included within the Scope Rule.

This precise issue has been previously addressed by the Board. In Third Division Award 39284, the Board made the following determination:

AWARD