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Washington, D.C.—The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee has voiced his serious concerns with a $1.2 billion Transportation Security Administration (TSA) private sector contract to perform a wide range of human resource activities over the next eight years—and he wants answers to a raft of questions about the matter.

The letter from Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) to TSA Administrator Kip Hawley comes one day after President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) was sharply and publicly critical of the TSA contract with Lockheed Martin Corp. NTEU has been working with the Homeland Security Committee to provide information from frontline employees on workplace issues.

“The profit Lockheed Martin will make from a $1.2 billion deal could be used to increase staffing and reduce congestion at our nation’s airports,” President Kelley said. “Is that not a much better use of taxpayers’ money?”

TSA is plagued by high turnover and low morale, stemming in large part from a pay system widely seen as confusing and subjective, as well as a workplace where their voices are not heard on such important issues as training and scheduling.

In a five-page letter to Hawley, Rep. Thompson called TSA’s Transportation Security Officers (TSOs) “the backbone of your agency,” and said these front-line employees “deserve clear guidelines, proper training, career development and a safe and healthy work environment.”

He added: “I am certain that you share my concern for their well-being. However, these problems cannot be ‘outsourced’ away.”

As President Kelley pointed out yesterday, the TSA contract would put Lockheed Martin in a position of supporting TSA recruitment and hiring; handling employee records; processing paychecks, and health and retirement benefits; and providing research into strategic workforce planning. Rep. Thompson has asked for information—by July 31—on these and a number of other matters relating to the contract.

The lengthy letter was one of two sent this week by Rep. Thompson to Hawley on workplace matters within the committee’s jurisdiction.

The initial letter seeks detailed information on staffing, operations and others matters relating to the TSA Office of Ombudsman. This letter comes in the wake of a report by the TSA inspector general about problems with the dispute resolution mechanism at TSA. President Kelley was sharply critical of TSA when that report was made public in late June.

“This report provides clear evidence of the need for collective bargaining rights for TSA employees including an effective and negotiated grievance procedure and having issues heard and decided by a neutral and outside third-party arbitrator,” the NTEU leader said. NTEU is leading the fight for legislation that would provide TSA employees with such rights.

Among other problems, the IG report cited instances of TSA managers using intimidation to discourage employees from taking advantage of internal processes—including use of the Office of Ombudsman. One employee, the IG said, allegedly was reprimanded for talking with the Ombudsman’s office—and then reprimanded a second time when he complained about the first reprimand to the same office.

“Without an effective and independent office that is empowered to be both advocate and defender,” Rep. Thompson wrote, “TSA employees will continue to face challenges in the workplace without appropriate institutional support.”

“The key to creating a stable, functioning agency able to meet its important responsibilities to the American people is for TSA employees to be granted collective bargaining rights,” President Kelley said. NTEU supports a measure, H.R. 3212, that would provide for such rights—which are presently widespread throughout the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). TSA is a unit of DHS.