Grievances over suggestion awards are not new. The two most common deal with disputes over the amount of money paid the employee for an adopted suggestion and whether an employee’s suggestion was actually adopted. But what can an employee do if the agency adopts the suggestion but denies him any award because it claims it was his job to think of ways improve the operation? Continue reading
The EEOC just published a wonderful guide to help employees and their union reps fight pregnancy discrimination. It is a bit long, but so thorough and easy to follow. The Commission offers 22 examples of how it believes managers violate the law. We recommend that busy union reps read through it just to expand their own sensitivities and that the local consider passing the link to any employees who are pregnant just to raise their awareness. Check out Pregnancy Discrimination and Related Issues
Too often employees decide not to file a discrimination claim because they believe it will mean a lot of work and heartache for very little payoff. We have tried to regularly post material to help you show that there can be very big and satisfying payoffs, one of which is money damages of $100,000 or more just for the emotional damages caused by discrimination. (See “Getting $$$,$$$ For Emotional Stress.”) However, Joshua F. Bowers, a private DC attorney, representing federal employees just posted in June a far more thorough list of all the cases where EEOC has awarded $100,000 or more for emotional stress. We borrowed the title of his article for this post and strongly recommend you check it out, especially when trying to give an undecided employee a little more motivation to stand up for himself or herself. Thanks, Josh.
One thing that distinguishes NTEU from almost every other multi-local union operating in the federal sector is that the decision to arbitrate a case in any unit is made by NTEU’s National President, the highest officer in the union of 150,000+ employees and over 230 locals spread across more than 30 federal agencies. One reason for that kind of control is to ensure that precedents set by arbitrators that often impact tens of thousands of employees in a single unit are carefully chosen to maximize the chances that the union will get the precedent it wants. Centralizing the arbitration invocation decision prevents two locals from taking conflicting theories to different arbitrators, arbitrating out of an emotional commitment rather than a strong set of facts, adopting a legal position with short-term gain but long-term disadvantages. etc. But is simple centralization in one person enough to fully protect members from bad case law precedent developing? Continue reading
Even if we have to say so ourselves, “Bravo, Fedsmill.com for hanging in there.” Next month is our three year anniversary and just this week we posted out 400th article. Not bad for a phone booth size operation of volunteers. We started this because we could see that none of the unions was sharing with their own local leaders and stewards the latest developments in case law and union administration that came as a result of what other unions were doing. So, we decided to pitch in and fill that gap by timely spreading around the newest developments in order to keep union reps just as up to date as their LR counterparts who spend thousands each year on training and news services. Our motivation is simple. We believe that ideas and information, like the wind, are invisible, but if properly tapped, as a wind mill (or turbine) does, they can produce great power for many. We also believe that unions, like any organizations, need to constantly examine what they are doing today and whether there are ways to do it better. Finally, as we have said often, we are not dispensing legal advice with our posts. We simply want to put information out that might make things better for unions and employees. Happy birthday to us.
MSPB wheeled out a great example why in a decision this week reversing an employee’s removal due to the withdrawal of his security clearance. After finding that the agency complied with all statutory adverse action requirements, the Board noted that agencies must also “comply with the procedures set forth in their own regulations.” (Blatt v. Dept. of the Army, 2014 MSPB 65 (2014)). If they do not and the employee can show harmful error, the adverse action is reversed. Continue reading
We did not see a formal public announcement about this, but are delighted to hear that Ken Moffett, Jr. has taken over as NTEU’s Director of Negotiations. (He replaces Frank Ferris, who held that job for all but four years since 1980 and who left NTEU last month after 38 years.) Ken came to NTEU almost ten years ago from the Federal Service Impasses Panel, where he mediated cases under Joe Schimansky’s guidance. He is a Fordham Law graduate and former Marine. Many of you will remember his dad, Ken Moffett, Sr, who ran the FMCS for several years before moving on to be Executive Director of the baseball players’ union and other union work. His mom was an organizer with the AFT. NTEU made a great choice to run the 10-lawyer department that negotiates all the union’s term agreements, many of its major midterm agreements, and that litigates most of its national, class-action arbitration cases.
There are several unions that specialize in representing federal employees, e.g., AFGE, NFFE, and NTEU. You could even say that they dominate the federal sector union landscape. However, the IFPTE continues to rack up organizing victories in the federal sector. It latest involved hundreds of NASA employees. We are delighted any time federal employees decide to unionize, but IFPTE’s continued victories raise an intriguing question. Why are employees scattering themselves across a wide variety of unions, such as SEIU, AFSCME, LIUNA, IFPTE, NNA, etc. rather than seeking help of the three better-known fed sector unions? Any thoughts?
AFGE has done it, NFFE has too, and now NWSEO has as well. They have all “put their money where their mouth is” and admitted that “it takes money to make money.” The point is that each of them has offered a $100 incentive for every new member. It is hard to imagine a national union leader preaching the importance of membership growth without putting a triple figure incentive in place to help local leaders actually recruit. While getting an immediate $100 pay off merely for signing up with the union is hardly the best reason to join a union, it seems to work. AFGE has used its $100 Bonus Bucks program, along with other mechanisms, to double the number of union members over the last decade or so. If a union’s leadership will not fund at least a $100 rebate program then it should stop pushing (nagging?) local leaders to get more members. If it will not do it at least to try to revive the union’s zombie locals, the leadership is cheating all the more successful locals that have to make up the funding zombies do not provide.
Every once in a while we run across a particularly good web site and when we do we try to share it with everyone as a potential model for what others could do. This week the AFGE HUD Council’s page caught our eye because of what members find when they click on “Bargaining” in the menu bar. The council not only provides readers with an update on all the bargaining it has and still is doing, but it has organized it in a very logical and attractive manner—as opposed to a mere chronological listing of MOU after MOU. Congrats, Council 222.