FederalDaily.com > NTEU Speaks Out on 2007 Pay Raise

FederalDaily - April 28, 2006

NTEU Speaks Out on 2007 Pay Raise

National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) President Colleen Kelley applauded the recent move by the House Armed Services Committee to request a 2.7 percent pay increase for military personnel in 2007, but urged lawmakers to do the same for civilian federal employees. President Bush’s 2007 budget request asked for only a 2.2 percent increase for both civilian feds and servicemembers—a rate, Kelley said, that would “fail to keep pace with inflation.” Now, in an April 26 statement, she called upon Congress to follow tradition and increase the civilian pay raise to 2.7 percent, to give civilians parity with military members. “NTEU will work for continuation of this important principle [pay parity] that serves the nation so well by enhancing and supporting federal agency recruiting and retention efforts,” Kelley said.

NSPS Launches with 11,000 DoD Employees

The Department of Defense (DoD) said on April 26 that the first phase of the new National Security Personnel System (NSPS) is ready to launch on April 30. “Spiral 1.1” includes 11,000 DoD civilian employees throughout the United States. “The most important message is that we are ready,” said Mary E. Lacey, NSPS program executive office. “Employees are trained, supervisors are trained, leaders are leaning forward, and we’re ready to go.” She said many employees are concerned about their supervisors’ ability to fairly evaluate performance. She said she reassures employees that supervisors have received extensive training and that multiple leaders will be involved in the performance-evaluation process. Program officials originally planned to include about 60,000 employees in Spiral 1.1, but several factors, including ongoing litigation over collective bargaining rules, led to curtailing that number. Now, only nonbargaining unit employees will be affected by Spiral 1.1.

Senate Committee Recommends Abolishing FEMA

A new study on the federal government’s response to Hurricane Katrina has led to the recommendation to abolish the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and create a new emergency response organization. The study, led by Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., made 86 recommendations to improve federal emergency management. Speaking to reporters after an April 27 hearing on FEMA, Collins said, “FEMA is discredited, demoralized and dysfunctional. It is beyond repair.” She added that, despite many good people at FEMA, a lack of leadership and resources has left the agency looking like a “symbol of bumbling bureaucracy.” The new report calls for establishing a National Preparedness and Response Authority (NPRA). The report recommends that the NPRA, unlike FEMA, be an independent agency within the Department of Homeland Security. NPRA would report directly to the president during catastrophic events, the report said.

Clothing Restriction for CBP Employees Eased

The National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) said it recently won a long-lasting battle with the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) over whether employees could wear cargo shorts. In a press release last week, Colleen Kelley, the union’s president, announced that CBP officials in air cargo areas, seaport cargo areas and land border passenger and cargo environments now have the option of wearing cargo shorts. The dispute began in 2004, when, NTEU says, CBP unilaterally chose to limit who could wear cargo shorts. The Federal Services Impasse Panel settled the disagreement, ruling in favor of NTEU. “There never was a rational, supportable basis for the CBP policy,” said Kelley. “It served only as another drag on employee morale in this troubled agency.”