NTEU Leader Kelley to Argue Against Expansion Of Regressive Personnel Policies at Oct. 5 House Hearing

Press Release September 22, 2005

Washington, D.C.—At a planned hearing on Oct. 5, President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) will tell a House subcommittee that proposed administration legislation to expand regressive personnel rules government-wide is excessively complex, expensive to administer and fatally flawed.

She will offer that assessment of the so-called Working for America Act (WFA) at a hearing of the House Government Reform Subcommittee on the Federal Workforce and Agency Organization, scheduled for 10 a.m., Wednesday, Oct. 5, in Room 2154 of the Rayburn House Office Building.

The subcommittee will be examining an administration proposal to expand throughout government elements of the personnel system it is seeking to implement in both the Departments of Homeland Security (DHS) and Defense (DoD). Acting on a suit brought by NTEU, a federal court already has declared significant elements of the proposed DHS system illegal.

In mid-summer, when the administration initially advanced the idea of moving the proposed DHS-DoD model government-wide, Kelley noted that senior members of Congress—on a bipartisan basis—were urging a go-slow approach in expanding policies that would significantly curtail employee collective bargaining, due process and appeal rights.

NTEU is the largest independent federal employee union representing 150,000 federal employees in 30 federal agencies and departments.

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