the use of quotas, but what about percentage goals and what about seniority systems, particularly which may not be, themselves, illegal in the Teamsters sense, but continue to frustrate affirmative action efforts for minorities, women, handicapped persons and in the religious area. The point to be learned here, as we address religious accommodations, is that, as employers, we feel we need specific options which are viable to assist us in the accommodations area.

A previous speaker spoke on the confusion resulting from the TWAHardison decision and, in my job, I have received similar comments from many managers and union officials as well.

In a more recent area where accommodation is dealt with directly, the accommodation responsibilities applied to disabled persons, recognize an obligation by employers and unions to examine the workplace, employment practices and related supporting activities in a manner which would then promote the employability of disabled persons. Such modifications which are to be made should be examined in terms of cost and business necessity and, usually, the disabled person can play a key role in the scope and nature of accommodations required for the safe and efficient performance of the job.

Our experience in this area, that placing similar provisions on persons for assisting us in defining appropriate religious accommodations, might, in fact, prove very helpful.

As we address the area of religious accommodations, though, I think we have to consider that they must be applied more carefully for the following reasons.

The freedom of religion, guaranteed by Title VII, means the right to believe in any religion or no religion at all. We must be careful forcefully requiring one employee to work another person's shift when the sole reason relates to religious beliefs of the second person. Weekend time is prime time in our society for most employees. It is a time when the entire family is most likely to be together, as well as the scheduling of a host of recreational activities.

Although each employee knows and understands the tradeoffs between an employer's work requirement and weekend activities, we must not impose nor enforce additional, non-voluntary, non-bargainedfor requirements on persons with neutral religious beliefs about weekend work activities.

In this regard, I see a significant difference between the accommodation opportunities in the religious versus the disabled area.

Accommodating one person's religious beliefs should not be made to the detriment of other employees or job applicants, and accommodating, obviously, cannot be considered without in the context of the single employee.

Certainly with the Teamsters and other seniority decisions, accommodation becomes more difficult when the role of seniority, wages and working conditions are laid down as part of a bona fide collective-bargaining agreement established with no religious discriminatory intent. In such an environment, accommodations initiated by an employer or union purely because of religious beliefs may be inappropriate and, perhaps, illegal. We have only to look at recent decisions from the Fifth Circuit and, perhaps, see that that trend can very likely develop.

Also, although I am not an expert in our Constitution, I do believe that religious accommodation, enforced by federal regulations and agency guidelines, may pose a difficulty with the First Amendment requiring complete neutrality in a religious area. Even though I am not an expert, this certainly does give me some concern.

Given these concerns, however, some of which are supported by recent court decisions and actions on the basis of organizations and unions, what types of accommodations have proven successful in our experience?

First of all, I think the initial job assignment and placement offers the greatest opportunity to accommodate the religious preferences of employees. We have had many internal issues resolved without informal cases being filed.

Examples: People of all ages, from young persons to 60-year-old people, seeking employment and seeking employment only between the hour of days of Monday and Friday; transfers to job areas that provide working conditions consistent with an employee's belief is usually a possibility with a large employer like Weyerhaeuser. This frequently occurs when religious awareness comes about later in a person's life. Our experience in this area has been very successful, primarily because of the seniority systems, because, in those cases, employees have had the necessary seniority to bid on jobs or vacancies that are available in other portions of our plant.

We have even had the experience of a shut-down or recall which allowed the union and the company to accommodate the religious placement of one individual, whereas, normally, our experience would be to only make one job offer to a person coming back from layoff. Arrangements were made where this person would be made job offers until such time that an opening met his religious convictions.

Voluntary arrangements with other fellow employees have also proven successful in the short-term. I think they do prove difficult in the long-term, however.

Posting notices, either by the union or the employer, seeking out people who would rather prefer to work on the weekends, usually for

more dollars, may provide candidates-and in our experience have provided people-willing to perform the necessary weekend work.

Some employees have suggested that they would be willing to pay other peoples' shift premium on weekend time. This has usually proved somewhat difficult, but it is mostly an accounting problem between our own internal accountants and some of our external, federal accounting for IRS and retirement issues.

Certainly, another opportunity which has proved effective in our company because, in our salaried work force, we have flexible working hours, is scheduled time off for religious observance consistent with employee-earned benefits, such as vacation or other types of flexible working arrangements.

Trading an organization's established holidays with others more consistent with a person's religious beliefs is also another area where we have had some success. Just this year, our company did not establish Good Friday as a corporate holiday, but, in our Southern operations, many of our employees traded that holiday for one of the others that were available.

I think, as I mentioned earlier, employers and, perhaps, the proposed regulations might state that employers and unions should seek the advice and recommendations of the persons desiring accommodations for their views. As I mentioned earlier, this has been very successful for us in the disabled area and, conceivably, could provide some assistance in this area as well.

And, finally, I would not want to leave out the opportunity to seek the advice of those members involved in the religious institution.

We have had several meetings where the members from the religious institution came forward, with the affected employee, and were able to work out a satisfactory arrangement with the employee.

The problem in these areas, as has been mentioned by some of the other speakers, is lesser benefits, which is always an issue when an employee is looking at a job transfer.

In summary, organizations, and large organizations like Weyerhaeuser, are less concerned about who performs the work as it pertains to religious preferences; rather, more concerned about the fact the work gets done.

Arrangements which are instituted between an individual desiring accommodation and other persons, employers and unions, we believe should be voluntary and incurred at minimal expense. Arrangements which infringe on the rights of others, I think, as we have learned in some of the other areas pertaining to equal employment opportunity, are somewhat dangerous and we question whether they should be endorsed.

I thank you for your time and attention.

If I can clarify any points on this testimony or the experiences we have had with formally-filed complaints or alternatives that we have resolved internally, I will be happy and willing to try to do so.

Commissioner LEACH: I am not sure, after listening to you, whether I understand whether Weyerhaeuser has a policy to accommodate to the requirements of individual employees who have religious needs or that it doesn't have a policy or, perhaps, endorses voluntary agreements, but that it is not really-it is sort of an ad hoc way, not really a policy, but if those who enter the workplace have to observe certain religious holidays or are Sabbath observers maybe or maybe not Weyerhaeuser will choose to try to accommodate. I am just not sure what

Mr. MAKI: The company's position, as it pertains to accommodation in this area, is exactly the same as in the disabled area. We do have a policy of trying to accommodate the religious beliefs of employees to the extent that it does not violate the rights of other employees. And, usually, those rights are those which are laid down as part of our collective-bargaining agreements.

As it pertains to our 11,000 salaried employees, I cannot envision, nor have we had a case, where we have had a problem accommodating the religious beliefs of employees who, for their reason, cannot work between sundown on Friday and sundown on Saturday, or any time during the weekend, for that matter.

When you deal with the employees that are represented by a third party, we act as a member of that group to resolve those kinds of complaints. In some cases where the person has had the seniority to bid into other areas of the operation, we have been effective in acting as a focal point to get that transfer made.

In areas where it has involved minor modifications to an existing collective-bargaining agreement, which does not, on the surface, violate the rights of other employees, those kinds of arrangements have been made.

So, I guess I would answer you by saying there is a policy. In practice, it is relatively easy with our salaried employees. It is relatively easy with initial job placement. It becomes more difficult with transfer opportunities where a religious belief is encountered later in a person's working career.

Commissioner LEACH: Thank you.

Commissioner Walsh?

Commissioner WALSH: Yes. I have a couple of questions along that

line.

You indicated with your 11,000 salaried employees you have practically no difficulty at all.

Mr. MAKI: Yes.

Commissioner WALSH: Where you do have areas of difficulty, have you any idea how often you are successful, percentage-wise?

Mr. MAKI: I don't recall any serious complaints that have ever been filed as it pertains to a salaried employee. We have had salaried employees

Commissioner WALSH: No. I am talking about the non-salaried ones, where you said now you do have problems because of transfer rightsthat type of thing. How often are you successful in making accommodation in that area and how often would you be unsuccessful?

Mr. MAKI: We have had, since we kept track of these records, 15 cases where a potential religious conflict arose; eleven of those were resolved internally through a transfer or initial placement of one kind or another where all parties were satisfied; four of them resulted in formally filed complaints; three of the formally filed complaints were no-cause complaints and one is still pending.

Commissioner WALSH: I guess that leads me to my final question. Did you say you had 45,000 employees?

Mr. MAKI: Yes, 42,000.

Commissioner WALSH: 42,000.

And I bring this question up because some of the people who have testified before seem to be very concerned if they do it for one, just think how they are going to have to do it for everyone and it almost sounds like 90 percent of the work force is going to request religious accommodation.

Now, out of 45,000 employees, how many, roughly, really are requesting religious accommodation?

Mr. MAKI: I think the statistics I gave you earlier are probably fairly accurate. It is in the neighborhood of a dozen or so.

Commissioner WALSH: Out of 45,000?

Mr. MAKI: Right. I don't think it is a major concern for our employees or our management or the unions to resolve.

Commissioner WALSH: Well, hopefully, that might allay the fears of some employers who seem to think that, if they accommodate for one, they are going to find

Mr. MAKI: I should mention, though, one thing I pointed out is that 85 to 90 percent of our operation is unionized and the working conditions associated with many of these jobs are spelled out pretty clearly before an employee is hired. So most employees know that, if they are planning on working in one of our plants with multiple shifts, where they will work and the working conditions associated with that. That does not mean, however, that there are no jobs available within that site that