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AFGE Week in Review (May 27, 2009) Senate Panel Moves 3 Bills at AFGE Urging: The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee last week passed three AFGE-backed bills concerning federal employees:
The full Senate is expected to vote on these bills either in June or July. Meanwhile, the Senate has approved the nomination of Robert Groves to be Director of the Census Bureau. AFGE supports Groves' nomination. AFGE Voices Concerns over NSPS Review: In response to the Pentagon's recent appointment of a task force to conduct a three-month review of the National Security Personnel System, AFGE said the Defense Department is wasting time and tax dollars reviewing a system that DoD employees, unions, and members of Congress already know does not work. "NSPS was the brainchild of the right wing neocons at the Heritage Foundation. It was advanced into law as a result of some very misleading proposals submitted by former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, which were designed to end employee civil service rights and their right to collective bargaining," AFGE President John Gage said. "Congress already has put several nails into the coffin of NSPS. We had hoped the Obama administration would make quick work of restoring the civil service system and putting an end to this costly albatross." The three-member task force will be chaired by Rudy deLeon, a senior vice president at the Center for American Progress, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank. The other members of the group are Michael Bayer, chairman of the Defense Business Board, and Robert Tobias, a professor at American University and director for the Institute for the Study of Public Policy Implementation. The panel's recommendations are due by the end of summer. TSA Is the Worst Place to Work in DHS, among Worst in Government: The Transportation Security Administration once again ranks at the very bottom of a new employee survey as the worst place to work in the Homeland Security Department. According to the "2009 Best Places to Work" survey, conducted biennially by the non-profit Partnership for Public Service, TSA scored 49.7 on the 100-point scale, the lowest among 13 DHS subcomponents. TSA is also one of the worst places to work in the federal government, ranking at 213 out of 231 agencies. Previous surveys conducted by the Partnership, DHS, and the Office of Personnel Management showed similar results. The poor rating reflects continuing maltreatment of employees and poor work conditions at TSA. The latest example includes the agency's refusal to provide adequate protections against the swine flu to Transportation Security Officers, who come in contact with hundreds of thousands of passengers everyday. Before the swine flu outbreak, TSA refused to replace the uniforms that were contaminated with toxic formaldehyde. TSOs are discouraged from filing a workers' compensation claim when injured on the job. They are put on leave restriction despite legitimate doctor's reports. They are retaliated against for bringing up workplace concerns to the ombudsman. The workers' opinion toward the way they are treated by managers clearly shows in the survey's five "Effective Leadership" categories, whose average score was below 40. Defense Employees Protest Outsourcing Studies: Defense employees led by AFGE's Defense Conference (DEFCON) held demonstrations last Friday in Columbus, Richmond, and New York, protesting the controversial use of outsourcing studies within the Defense Department. The demonstrations took place at the Defense Logistics Agency Supply Centers in Columbus, Ohio and Richmond, Va., where more than 300 jobs are being competed for possible outsourcing, and at the West Point Military Academy in New York where 400 employees have just lost the public-private competition. The workers were angry that DoD refused to stop the outsourcing studies, all of which have dragged on well over the 30-month statutory time limitation, essentially wiping out the savings that might have incurred. AFGE brought the issue up with several lawmakers, who urged that the studies be stopped but were turned down by the Bush administration holdover. AFGE Asks Obama to Shelve A-76: In response to the Obama administration's request for AFGE's opinion on the job competition process, the union urged the administration to immediately shut down all pending job competitions before any more damage is done. In the May 18, 12-page letter to Jeffrey Liebman, Office of Management and Budget executive associate director, AFGE detailed what went wrong with the outsourcing program championed by President Bush as a way to fulfill his 2000 presidential campaign pledge to review 425,000 federal jobs for possible outsourcing. Chief among the serious problems are the imaginary or exaggerated savings, the expensive and unfair job competition process, unenforced time limits, and the arbitrary interpretation of law to make the otherwise illegal studies stay within statutory time limits. Included in the letter were examples of bungled job competitions at Miramar Marine Corps Air Station, West Point Military Academy, and Defense Logistics Agency Supply Centers in Columbus and Richmond. AFGE Kicks off Insourcing Campaign: AFGE has kicked off its campaign to raise awareness among AFGE Locals that now is the time to push their agencies to bring contracted out jobs back in-house. Following last month's introduction of the CLEAN UP Act, a bill that would suspend the job competition process and encourage insourcing, AFGE has been working to garner support among lawmakers to co-sign the Correction of Longstanding Errors in Agencies Unsustainable Procurements Act, S. 924, which currently has 10 co-sponsors in the Senate. The campaign is part of AFGE's years-long fight to stop waste, fraud, and abuse in contracting out. AFGE successfully fought back against the Bush administration's plan to contract out half of all federal employee jobs with the most recent victory being this fiscal year's ban on new outsourcing studies across government. The House version of the CLEAN UP Act is expected to be introduced later this week. New OPM Chief Pushes for More Telework: After meeting with AFGE President John Gage, Office of Personnel Management Director John Berry announced a plan to increase the number of teleworkers as a way to reduce traffic and improve employee morale and productivity. Berry's plan is drawn from two AFGE-backed bills introduced in Congress earlier this year: H.R.1722 and S.707. Under the plan, an advisory group of telework program managers will be set up to set goals to increase telework. Then agencies will submit their telework policies for review against the goals. Agencies will be encouraged to appoint a Telework Managing Officer who would oversee the agency's telework program. Agencies will also be encouraged to come up with a fair and transparent appeal process for employees whose telework applications are denied. Training will be provided to both employees and managers to make sure telework is implemented successfully and to erase fear and resistance to having staff work out of sight. AFGE has been at the forefront in promoting telework in the federal government. Telework is an important part of agency Continuity of Operations Plans implemented during a national health or weather emergency, but today only 5 percent of the nation's 1.9 million federal employees telework. Navy Told to Allow More People to Telework: An arbitrator earlier this month ordered the Naval Inventory Control Point in Mechanicsburg, Pa., to toss out its short list of positions eligible for telework and to start considering each telework application on a case-by-case basis. Under the telework agreement negotiated with AFGE Local 1156, all employees may apply for telework and their applications should be considered on a case-by-case basis. The Navy, however, came up with a list of 55 positions out of 900 that were potentially eligible for telework, effectively scaring away employees who wished to telework. AFGE subsequently filed a grievance after management refused to follow the agreement. The union said the employees only sought one or two days a pay period for telework, but the agency always came up with reasons to deny their requests, including security concerns, inadequate connectivity speed, and the need for face to face work even though many did almost all of their work on a computer. The arbitrator concluded that the Navy violated the agreement, saying the agency's reasons for its extremely slow implementation of the telework agreement were pretextual. He ordered the agency to scrap the list of 55 positions and start following the agreement. The agency will also notify the union in writing every month of steps it has taken to remove telework barriers. AFGE's General Counsel Office provided legal representation at the hearing. Obama Administration Voices Support for TSO Whistleblower Rights: For the first time since taking office, the Obama administration earlier this month went on the record to voice support for whistleblower protections for Transportation Security Officers. In a testimony before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform May 14, Rajesh De, deputy assistant attorney general at the Justice Department's Legal Policy Office, said the Obama administration is pleased that the AFGE-backed whistleblower protections bill, H.R. 1507, provides full whistleblower protection to Transportation Security Officers. "Transportation Security Officers stand literally at the front lines of our nation's homeland security system, De said. "They deserve the same whistleblower protections afforded to all other employees of the Department of Homeland Security." Under an agreement between TSA and the Merit Systems Protection Board, TSOs can appeal whistleblower retaliation complaints to MSPB, but it's not clear if the board's decisions are binding. TSOs still cannot appeal a negative MSPB decision to the federal courts, which current whistleblower protection law allows other federal workers to do. Inside Government: A new task force designed to review the National Security Personnel System (NSPS) was discussed last week on AFGE's radio show "Inside Government". AFGE General Counsel Mark Roth explained the new task force and AFGE's reaction to its creation. Roth also detailed the history of NSPS and why AFGE wants the pay-for-performance system to be eliminated. Darryl Moch, executive director of the Labor Heritage Foundation, previewed the Great Labor Arts Exchange and Conference on Creative Organizing scheduled for June 20 – 23. Moch also discussed Camp Solidarity for children and youth ages 7 – 14. To find out more about these events, designed to strengthen the labor movement through art and creativity, please visit www.laborheritage.org. Also appearing on the show was Richard N. Haass, author of "War of Necessity, War of Choice: A Memoir of Two Iraq Wars." Haass, who served in senior positions for President George H.W. Bush and President George W. Bush, analyzed the decisions that lead to both Iraq wars and offer unique insight to the role of a senior government official during a time of war. Haass also shared his dissenting opinion for the second Iraq war, one he calls a "war of choice." "Inside Government" - hosted by AFGE Assistant General Counsel J. Ward Morrow - airs on Fridays at 10 a.m. EDT nationwide on Federal News Radio at www.federalnewsradio.com and 1500 AM in the Washington, D.C., area. Programs are archived on the Federal News Radio Web site and can be heard on demand at http://www.federalnewsradio.com or http://www.afge.org/insidegovernment. Please note there will be a short advertisement prior to the start of the program. The program also airs on Saturdays at 7 a.m. on KTKK 630 AM, "The Voice of Utah," in Ogden, Utah sponsored by AFGE Local 1592. |
