John,
This weekend, let us honor the mothers among us!
As we approach Mother’s Day, I would like to take this opportunity to urge everyone who is lucky enough to have a mother in their lives to celebrate her – whether she is your own mother, the mother of your children, or someone who has been a mother to you or someone you love. It’s easy to be cynical about holidays that seem as though they’re meant to sell flowers or greeting cards, or even to sell restaurant meals that give mothers “a day off” from cooking duties. But failing to set aside a special day to honor the women who nurture, guide, support, teach, and protect children of every age would be unthinkable.
We should also pause to thank the mothers of our labor movement, from Mother Jones (Mary Harris), a 19th century union activist from Chicago known for quotes like “pray for the dead and fight like h-ll for the living” to our own first recipient of the AFGE Women's and Fair Practices “Women of Labor Award,” NVAC President Alma Lee, women have been on the front lines fighting for workers’ rights, fairness, and a better standard of living for working families.
AFGE Continues the Fight for Full Title 5 Rights for TSA Officers
One of the highlights of this past week was the hearing held by the House Homeland Security Committee’s Subcommittee on Transportation and Maritime Security on H.R. 903, the Rights for the TSA Workforce Act. I testified on behalf of AFGE in favor of extending to TSOs the full protections of Title 5, including pay, collective bargaining, and due process rights.
It’s hard to believe that, even though we’ve been fighting for full rights for TSOs for almost 20 years, some so-called experts try to justify with a straight face a “separate but unequal” system for a segment of the federal workforce that is mostly made up of people of color.
Nobody at the hearing seemed to question whether TSOs were underpaid, but the notion of extending to TSOs the same rights as other federal employees, and putting them into the same pay system as other federal employees (including their TSA supervisors) seemed for some lawmakers to be a bridge too far. But we got a lot of good press, there’s a lot of good momentum, and I’m confident that we will get H.R. 903 passed into law.
Highlighting Ongoing Needs of Public Servants for PSRW
We also held a virtual press conference for Public Service Recognition Week that included National Local 4060 President Steve Reaves (FEMA), Local 1988 President Geddes Scott (VA), DEFCON Chair and Local 1410 President Felicia Sharp (DHA), Local 333 President Joe Shuker (TSA), Local 4070 President Jonathan Zumkehr (BOP), myself, and AFGE staff. Each of these AFGE leaders told stories about the consequences of low pay and lack of adequate staffing and how that affects not only the agencies’ ability to recruit and retain, but also how these problems affect general operations.
We highlighted these ongoing issues instead of the usual feel-good PSRW approach for a reason. The public needs to understand that the decade of budget-cutting, combined with the previous administration’s relentless attacks on the federal workforce generally and our union specifically, had a real cost. Building back better will take time, and resources, and a real understanding of just how extensive the damage has been.
Advocating for Civilian DoD Employees
I also sent a letter this week to Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks on several issues having to do with DoD’s personnel policies including overuse of term and temporary appointments, the grave threat to civilian control of the military and the political independence of the civil service posed by the prospect of taking civilians from Title 5 to Title 10, and the importance of keeping the excepted service the exception and competitive hiring the rule.
Pressuring the Administration on Rights of Title 38 Employees at VA
We’ve also kept up the pressure to get full collective bargaining rights and protections for VA’s Title 38 employees. We sent two letters on this issue to Capitol Hill this week, following upon a Statement for the Record from April, and we also brought it up twice on two District 4 leaders calls with members of Congress. On the second call, we had both Senator Kaine and Senator Warner as well as Representatives Bobby Scott and Elaine Luria.
Secretary McDonough has the authority to rescind the previous VA Secretary’s memorandum on this subject, and we need to get him to act. But we also need a law to prevent any future VA Secretary from ever taking away Title 38 rights again.
AFGE NOW Power Hour with Sara Nelson was a big hit!
Last night we had our first AFGE NOW Power Hour on Facebook Live, which we plan to do every month. We had EEOC Council President Rachel Shonfield, Local 1224 President Linda Ward-Smith, and AFA President Sara Nelson on to share their best ideas for organizing and fire up our membership.
President Nelson delivered inspiring remarks about the work AFGE members have done and the victories we have in store for us as we continue growing our union and growing our power. I encourage you all to visit Facebook and view the recording if you weren’t able to join us last night. It was a really inspirational hour, celebrating our accomplishments, and I promise you – it will fire you up to get organizing NOW!
In Solidarity,
Dr. Everett Kelley
AFGE National President
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