16:0623(89)NG - AFGE Local 1533 and Navy, Navy Commissary Store Region, Oakland and Navy Commissary Store, Alameda, CA -- 1984 FLRAdec NG

 16 FLRA No. 89
 
 AMERICAN FEDERATION OF
 GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES,
 LOCAL 1533
 Union
 
 and
 
 DEPARTMENT OF NAVY,
 NAVY COMMISSARY STORE REGION,
 OAKLAND, AND NAVY COMMISSARY
 STORE, ALAMEDA, CALIFORNIA
 Agency
 
                                            Case No. O-NG-753
 
                 DECISION AND ORDER ON NEGOTIABILITY ISSUE
 
    The petition for review in this case comes before the Authority
 pursuant to section 7105(a)(2)(E) of the Federal Service
 Labor-Management Relations Statute (the Statute), and raises an issue
 regarding the negotiability of the following Union proposal.
 
          New bargaining unit employees, will not have to accept direct
       deposit or mail as a condition of employment but will have the
       same options of current bargaining unit employees.
 
    Upon careful consideration of the entire record, including the
 parties' contentions, the Authority makes the following determination.
 The Union's proposal would require the Agency to maintain for new
 employees the manner of paycheck distribution which is presently used in
 distributing paychecks to current employees, i.e. distribution of
 paychecks to the workplace.  The Agency has refused to bargain over the
 proposal contending, among other things, that the disputed proposal
 concerns the technology, methods and means of performing work within the
 meaning of section 7106(b)(1) of the Statute and thus is negotiable only
 at the election of the Agency.  Thus, the proposal and arguments raised
 by the Agency in the instant petition are identical in effect to those
 at issue in Federal Employees Metal Trades Council, AFL-CIO, and
 Department of the Navy, Mare Island Naval Shipyard, Vallejo, California,
 16 FLRA 88 (1984), wherein the Authority ruled that the Union's proposal
 interferes with the Agency's right to determine its methods and means of
 performing work and is therefore outside the duty to bargain.  Hence,
 for the reasons stated and the cases cited in Mare Island Naval
 Shipyard, the Authority concludes that the Union's proposal interferes
 with the Agency's right to determine its methods and means of performing
 work and is therefore outside the duty to bargain under the Statute.
 /1/
 
    Accordingly, pursuant to section 2424.10 of the Authority's Rules and
 Regulations, IT IS ORDERED that the Union's petition for review be, and
 it hereby is, dismissed.  Issued, Washington, D.C., November 30, 1984
                                       Henry B. Frazier III, Acting
                                       Chairman
                                       Ronald W. Haughton, Member
                                       FEDERAL LABOR RELATIONS AUTHORITY
 
 
 
 
 
 
 --------------- FOOTNOTES$ ---------------
 
 
    /1/ In view of the decision herein, the Authority finds it
 unnecessary to address the remaining contentions of the Agency as to the
 negotiability of the proposal.