The FLRA staff has three online training programs coming up this month. If interested, click on the course’s link and sign up. The course are as follows:
EVENT DATE: July 08, 2025 –Virtual from 1:00pm until 3:30pm EASTERN TIME
EVENT DATE: July 15, 2025–Virtual from 1:00pm until 3:30pm EASTERN TIME.
Event date: July 22, 2025–Virtual from 11:00am until 4:30pm EASTERN TIME.
Now let’s turn to the common labor agreement requirement that the grievance include “the article(s) and section(s) violated.” Again, this sounds simple and very often is, but there are important exceptions. Continue reading
Now that Trump has declared that suddenly hundreds of thousands of feds are involved in national security work, those employees’ unions have lost the right to bargain contracts, take grievances to arbitration, and demand certain kinds of information. Consequently, a lot of employees are probably questioning why they should bother to pay dues anymore. Well, there are a bundle of good reasons to remain union members that The Revengernator has not taken away from employees and their unions. For example, unions can still represent employees before third party officials in the following situations: Continue reading
Most labor-management agreements list a few simple items that must be addressed to file a valid grievance, e.g., 1- name of the grievant, 2- agreement article and section violated, 3- date of violation, 4- brief description of the violation, 5- remedy requested, and 6- name and contact number of union rep. So, an inexperienced union rep might think it is therefore easy to draft a grievance, but the experienced rep knows that there are some serious strategy issues to decide under each of those six items. This is the first in a six-part series that will explain what those strategic issues are. Part I deals with the Name of the Grievant. What is so complex about that you might be asking yourself? Well, to borrow some famous words from our childhood, “Gather around and you shall hear.” Continue reading
Unions are fighting Trump and the ghost of Elon in very imaginative ways. I always love to see unions stepping outside the normal collective bargaining tools such as ULP’s, grievances, etc. to surprise the White House by coming from a new direction. AFGE did just that by winning a case in federal court this week. The judge wrote, “The plaintiffs [AFGE} have shown that the defendants disclosed OPM records to individuals who had no legal right of access to those records. In doing so, the defendants violated the Privacy Act and departed from cybersecurity standards that they are obligated to follow….This was a breach of law and of trust. Tens of millions of Americans depend on the Government to safeguard records that reveal their most private and sensitive affairs,….” Here is a new story with more details about AFGE’s victory. Who knows? Perhaps we will all be getting a check from DOGE for damage done.
Given how casually Trump is activating National Guard units don’t be surprised if some of your members are pulled away soon. A court has just improved the benefits they get while deployed. Thought we would pass that news along just to alert you so you are not totally unaware of the change when a member approaches you. Check out the FEDweek post here.
Sexual harassment is a well-known and well-litigated matter. Mainstream media write about it often and most employers have policies prohibiting it. But how many have heard of “age harassment” or an age-hostile work environment? Here is what it is about and how to prove it. In a federal circuit court case titled Milan Dediol V. Best Chevrolet Incorporated Donald Clay, a 65 year old man claimed that his manager regularly addressed him as “old motherf****r,” “old man,” and “pops.” Continue reading
Hey, Harvard! You will get a kick out of this. While Trump is beating you senseless because he alleges you do not treat Jews properly, he just nominated as Special Counsel, the government’s top ethics enforcer, someone who spends his time standing up for antisemites and similar trash. Just google the word “Ingrassia” with the words Fuentes or Tate. For Feds this probably means that going to the Special Counsel for help will not only be useless, but probably result in that office opening an investigation into you as a suspected DEI-loving, waste-generating, immigrant-supportive, anti-Christian, multi-gender enemy of the people. We can hope that enough Senators will be offended by this nomination to stop it, but that will not happen unless a whole lot of feds write, email or call their Senators asking them to vote against this insanity.
AFGE just won an injunction stopping White House actions against federal employees that is not just a “whopper,” but a “mega-whopper.” The Trump-Musk axis ordered agencies to undertake wholesale RIFs’ so it can generate enough alleged savings to justify another tax cut for the wealthy—and contract out the work to privateers. AFGE creatively put together a team of other unions, about a dozen non-profit organizations, and six local governments charging the President’s actions are against the law and arbitrary, capricious, and an abuse of discretion. Long story short, AFGE won an injunction blocking any RIF’s for two weeks while the court considers further action against the White House Fed-haters. Continue reading