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Washington, D.C.—Unless withdrawn and substantially rewritten, the new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) personnel regulations will fail the nation because they “create an environment of mistrust and uncertainty” among the workforce, the leader of the union representing thousands of DHS employees told a Senate committee today.

President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) described as “a unique opportunity lost” the decision by DHS and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to reject the work of NTEU and other DHS unions over the past two years in offering reasonable proposals that would have met the agency’s needs while preserving employee rights.

Kelley made her comments in testimony before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Government Management, the Federal Workforce and the District of Columbia, chaired by Senator George Voinovich (R-OH).

NTEU has filed suit alleging DHS and OPM overstepped the authority given by Congress in the Homeland Security Act (HSA). Under HSA, employees are to have the right to organize, bargain collectively and participate, through labor organizations of their own choosing, in decisions which affect them.

On the contrary, Kelley said, the regulations fall far short of protecting employee rights in labor relations and collective bargaining, as well as their due process rights. By exceeding the statutory authority in HSA, she said, “these regulations will leave employees with little or no confidence that they will be treated fairly by the agency.”

In her testimony, President Kelley attacked the regulations as failing to meet the law’s requirements by its lack of independent third party review of collective bargaining disputes; its drastic reduction in negotiability rights; its non-negotiability over department-wide regulations; and the changes it purports to make in the duties and operations of the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA) and Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB).

The NTEU president also took issue with the DHS plan to remove its employees from under the General Schedule pay plan and instead place them, over time, under an unspecified pay-for-performance program. She also was critical of giving the DHS secretary unfettered discretion to create a list of mandatory removal offenses appealable only to an internal DHS board; and in other shortcomings.

Stressing that NTEU continues to fully support the DHS mission and personnel, Kelley said NTEU “strongly believes that changes are needed in these regulations if the agency’s goal is to build a DHS workforce that feels both valued and respected.” She pledged to work with Congress and the administration to achieve that goal.

At the same time, however, President Kelley said she would “strongly caution both Congress and the administration” against extending the DHS regulations throughout the federal government. She called any such plans “ill-advised” and said NTEU “will vigorously oppose any efforts” by the administration to do so.

NTEU is the largest independent federal union, representing some 150,000 employees in 30 agencies and departments, including more than 15,000 in DHS.