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Washington, D.C.—At a meeting today with senior executives of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the head of the National Treasury Employee Union (NTEU) and a delegation of NTEU TSA leaders outlined a number of significant recommendations to address serious workplace issues including fairly applying leave policies, improving training and remediation and moving TSA employees to the General Schedule pay system.

“Collective bargaining and a fair, transparent and credible pay system would put TSA in a much better position to perform its vital national security function,” said NTEU President Colleen M. Kelley. “Until collective bargaining is a reality, we pressed for a number of actions that could be implemented today that would address in meaningful ways the critical problems impacting the agency’s workforce on a daily basis.”

President Kelley was joined at the meeting by a number of NTEU-represented frontline Transportation Security Officers (TSOs) who related in detail their first-hand knowledge of workplace issues generating the low morale and high turnover within the TSA workforce.

The NTEU delegation presented TSA management with a white paper, entitled “Building a Strong and Effective TSA Workforce,” outlining many of the critical issues facing the TSA workforce including the pay system, testing and certification, leave and attendance, workers compensation and reasonable accommodation, disciplinary actions, the TSA grievance procedure and shifts and schedules. The white paper also outlined specific solutions to many of these issues.

“This meeting was an opportunity to engage in a frank discussion of issues affecting both TSA and its employees,” President Kelley said, noting that while she applauds the idea of a continuing dialogue, “it does not take the place of the full collective bargaining rights TSOs need and deserve.” Under the law establishing TSA, the agency head has the authority to grant its employees the right to bargain collectively.

NTEU is pressing for legislation to secure bargaining rights for TSOs; the union also is engaged in an aggressive organizing campaign and already represents thousands of TSA employees at airports across the country.

Along with bargaining rights, the agency’s pay system is a serious issue there. NTEU is pursuing implementation of a five-point program for TSOs, centering on securing collective bargaining and moving TSA employees from their current pay system, and including a push for adequate staffing and fair scheduling, improved training and revised recertification procedures, as well as the grant of full whistleblower rights for employees.

These serious matters, and others—including leave and attendance, and grievances and discipline issues—were on the table during today’s lengthy meeting. These are among the recommendations advanced by NTEU:

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Educate managers on employee rights under TSA’s leave policies, including the right to leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act;

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Administer tests that reflect "live" screening conditions and adopt remediation procedures that allow them to learn from their mistakes;

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Have trained, experienced and accessible workers compensation staff on hand to quickly and effectively deal with workplace injuries—TSA has the highest injury rates in the federal government;

“Each of these recommendations, and others that we made and will advance as we move forward, is critical to establishing a stable, professional, motivated workforce at TSA,” the NTEU president said. “I look forward to working with TSA to achieve that goal.”

President Kelley said she was pleased with the willingness of the senior TSA leaders to take this important first step after years of employee concerns being ignored by the previous administration officials. “I look forward to the day when the TSA workforce has a real seat at the table where decisions are being made about their work lives,” said Kelley.

As the largest independent federal union, NTEU represents 150,000 employees in 31 agencies and departments, including the entire 24,000-employee U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) workforce. Both CBP and TSA are units of the Department of Homeland Security.

Note: To read NTEU’s white paper, “Building a Strong and Effective TSA Workforce,” click here.