1225 CONNECTICUT AVENUE, N.W., WASHINGTON, D.C. 20036/AREA CODE: 202-659-9320
WILLIAM H. DEMPSEY, Chairman H. E. GREER, Vice Chairman ROBERT BROWN, Vice Chairman
 W. L. BURNER, Jr., Director of Research 1. F. GRIFFIN, Director of Labor Relations
 D. P. LEE, General Counsel T. F. STRUNCK, Administrator of Disputes Committees


Mr. Milton Friedman
 850 Seventh Avenue
 New York, New York 10019

 Dr. Murray M. Rohman
 Professor of Industrial Relations
 Texas Christian University
 Fort Worth, Texas 76129

 Mr. Nicholas H. Zumas
 1990 M Street, N. W.
 Washington, D. C. 20036

 Gentlemen:

 This will supplement our previous letters with which we forwarded to you copies of Awards of Special Board of Adjustment No. 605 established by Article VII of the February 7, 1965 Agreement.

 There are attached copies of Award Nos. 378 and 379, inclusive dated May 30, 1974 rendered by Special Board of Adjustment No. 605.

                              l


cc. Chairman, Employees National Conference Committee (10)
 C. J. Chamberlain (2)
 C. L. Dennis (2)
    M. B. Frye (2) -

    W. W. Altus (2)

    H/. C. Crotty (2)

    ~. J. Berta (2)

    R. W. Smith (2)

    R. K. Quinn, Jr. (3)

    W. F. Euker

    T. F. Strunck

                                      AWARD N0. 3 7Y

                                      Case No. SG-36-E


          SPECIAL BOARD OF ADJUSTMENT N0. 605


PARTIES ) Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines
 TO THE ) and
 DISPUTE ) Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen

 STATEMENT
 OF CLAIM: (a) Claim that the Company violated Article 1,
 Section 4 of the Agreement of February 7,
 1965, when it failed to notify the employes
 of the Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines,
 C. & S. Department, that it was suspending
 operations and positions thereby causing
 these employes to report for work at their
 respective starting time and headquarters,
 only to be advised there was no work on
 Monday, July 17, 1967, account of viola
 tions cited in claim (a).

              (b) Claim that each and every one of the employes listed below be paid eight (8) hours at the straight time rate of their respective positions for July 17, 1967, account of violations cited in the claim (a) above:


            M. F. Walsh, Inspector J. T. McAviney, Mtr. Test

            R. L. Danley, Inspector A. 0. Postoll, Mtr. Cum.

            G. C. Thompson, Foreman A. L. Hansel, Leading Sig-

            W. E. Coho, Foreman nalman

            H. D. Kendall, Mtr. H. E. McNemar, Signalman

            R. P. Schwartz, Mtr. W. M. Posey, Signalman

            W. G. Gifford, Mtr. N. DeLucca, Signalman

            R. B. Inman, Mtr. Ft. J. Sigmund, Signalman

            E. S. Reed, Mtr. W. Hyndman, Signalman

            D. G. Jordan, Mtr. C. A. Giordano, Signalman

            S. J. hice, Mtr. T. F. Seher, Signalman

            J. P. Shelton, Mtr. D. B. Thwaites, Signalman

            R. K. Maynard, Mtr. J. J. Bogan, Signalman

                                      AWARD NO. 3 78

                                      Case No. SG-36-E .,/0


          R. W. McCormick, Mtr. E. F. Senior, Elec. Mtr.

          C. S. Hoffman, Mtr. L. A. Santora, Helper

          T. N. Allen, Mtr. J. J. Essl, Helper

          R. L. Connelly, Mtr. N. 0. Rose, Helper

          D. L. Palbo, Helper V. J. Passalaqua, Helper

          J. D. Ashton, Helper W. H. Gilbert, Atc., In

          C. A. Seca, Helper spector


          Includes all that had not been on vacation that day.


OPINION
 OF BOARD: On August 18, 1967, a claim was filed by the Local
 Chairman, seeking eight-hours' pay for a number of
 employees who allegedly never received proper notifi
 cation not to report due to a strike by another organization.
 Claim was denied on September 7 and appealed on September 9. On
 November G, 1967, Carrier's General Manager denied the appeal.

            In accordance with the parties' Agreement of De-

cember 1, 1951, concerning the procedures for handling disputes,
 a joint submission by the General Manager and the Local Chairman
 was to be prepared. It was to include a joint statement of fact _w
 and the positions of each side. Following preparation of this
 document, the question is to be taken up at a meeting of the Gen
 eral Manager and the General Chairman.

 Accordingly, the Local Chairman on November 12 requested the preparation of such a statement. On February 5, 1968, the General Manager replied with its proposal. The letter stated, in part:

            If the proposed Facts are satisfactory, kindly so advise and send us your Position. We shall then complete the Joint Submission.


Year after year thereafter passed without a word from the Organization. Then, on December 8, 1972, a new Local Chairman wrote to Carrier stating that "I hereby re-state and re-submit our claim dated August 18, 1967." Carrier replied on January 29, 1973, not only denving the claim on its merits, but

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                                      AWARD N0. 3 78

                                      Case No. SG-36-E


also noting:

            In view of the lapse of time between February 5, 1968, the date of the General Manager's letter to Local Chairman Nack furnishing the proposed "Joint Statement of Agreed-Upon Facts" and December 12, 1972, the date of your letter referred to above, it is apparent that this claim has long since been abandoned and cannot now properly be progressed.


Correspondence ensued thereafter, the Organization's letter of February 9, 1973, stating that it did not agree "that this is an abandoned claim." Ultimately the parties drafted a joint submission on June 27, 1973. Both Carrier's stated position in the submission and its letter maintained that the claim had been abandoned and could not be progressed. The Organization's statement of position made no reference to this point, and offered no explanation why Carrier might be in error in its view.

 Carrier acted with "reasonable promptness" in preparing a proposed joint statement of fact on February 5, 1968. The Organization did not. Silence prevailed. A delay of five years, which involved not only a failure to participate in preparing a submission but even in acknowledging Carrier's, is an inexplicable, unwarranted and unjustifiable course of conduct under. the December 1, 1951 Agreement on grievance-handling procedures.

 There could be only one legitimate defense which could withatand Carrier's abandonment argument: evidence of a mutual agreement to defer processing the claim for such an inordinate length of time. And in its submission to this Committee, the Organization for the first time referred to a letter from the General Manager to the General Chairman dated December 13, 1967, which allegedly stated:

                          -3-

                                      AWARD N0. .3 79 Case No. SG-36-E ''r


            The Joint Submission in this case has not

            been completed. We suggest meeting the

            schedule after completion of the Joint

            Submission and that decision be extended

            sixty (60) days from date claims were

            discussed in accordance with the provisions

            of Article V of the August 21, 1954, Agreement.


According to the Organization, this extended the time limits indefinitely and made its resubmission of the claim proper at any time. Carrier asserted it had no record of such a letter. During the Committee's consideration of the case, the Organization offered to supply it.

 However, the place to have submitted the letter and the argument was on the property, where it could have been dealt with properly. Instead, no reference to it ever was made there. Why the Organization failed to mention the existence of an alleged waiver of time limits, even during the protracted handling of the claim from December 8, 1972, to August 13, 1973, is unknown. In any event, as other Awards of this Board, including No. 239 and No. 365, have held, the Disputes Committee is not the
 locus for evidence offered for the first time to resolve factual r/
 conflicts that could have been resolved on the property.

 Even if the statements attributed to Carrier were to be credited in toto, it does not justify the Organization's posture. The absence of a terminal date for the joint submission in the December 13, 1967, letter would not have meant that there was an in-perpetuity waiver of time limits. It would be altogether illogical to assume that Carrier intended to give the Organization the right to raise the issue a year or five years or twenty years later, when its economic situation could not have been foretold and when first-hand essential evidence might no longer be obtainable. The latter is especially true considering that the parties had not yet agreed upon a joint statement of fact.

 The rule of reason dictates that Carrier at best was postponing a meeting on the subject until --in the normally near

                                      AWARD N0. %? 7S

                                      Case No. SG-36-E


future-- the routine of arriving at a joint submission was completed. Carrier's reasonably prompt draft of such a submission, less than two months after the alleged December 13 letter, supports this view. It belies the Organization's argument that no matter what Carrier did, the Organization need do nothing for years thereafter, while still retaining its right to proceed.

 Moreover, even under the letter upon which the Organization relies, there is no suggestion that preparation of the joint submission is to be delayed. It simply noted that it had not yet been completed and suggested that the required meeting be scheduled once the joint submissions were finished. The Organization's quotation from the General Manager's letter of December 13, 1967, does not indicate that the joint submission was to be completed whenever the Organization decided to do so, even if it ran into many years.

 Finally, the very words used by the Organization in its letter of December 8, 1972, in which it resubmitted the claim, establishes that the August 18, 1967, claim hadbeen allowed to expire, rather than that its processing was now merely resuming in accordance with a mutually agreeable deferment of time limits. Thus, by any logical standard, this claim was long since abandoned and cannot be revived by unilateral action.

                        AWARD


                    Claim denied.


                            p ~~92~ Milton Fr a an Neutral Member


Dated: Washington, D.C.
 May 30, 1974
 4

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