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Washington, D.C.— In continuing a push to bring Transportation Security Administration (TSA) employees under federal civil service protections, the leader of the union representing thousands of TSA Officers (TSOs) today sent a letter to members of the House of Representatives urging them to cosponsor a key measure that would provide TSOs with collective bargaining rights for the first time.

H.R. 1881 would formally amend the 2001 law that created TSA to provide TSOs with civil service protections under Title 5, including collective bargaining rights, and would move them onto the General Schedule (GS), putting the brakes on the agency’s current failed pay-for-performance personnel system.

“TSA employees labor under a system that has almost completely demoralized them,” President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) said. “We can strengthen TSA by providing its workers with a pay and performance system that is fair, credible and transparent, and with a voice in the development of workplace quality standards that will make the traveling public even safer.” NTEU’s efforts, following today’s letter, will begin with the nearly 200 members of the House who have cosponsored previous legislation that included collective bargaining provisions for TSOs.

Eliminating TSA’s unfair PASS (Performance and Accountability Standards System) and providing collective bargaining rights by statute would allow TSA employees to have a united workplace voice as well as an avenue to share their thoughts and ideas on ways to develop and improve workplace policies and practices, Kelley said.

President Kelley worked closely with Rep. Nita Lowey (D-N.Y.), House Homeland Security Committee Chair Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), and Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) to craft H.R 1881. Last month, the three lawmakers also sent a letter to their congressional colleagues urging their support for collective bargaining rights at TSA.

Calling the measure “fundamental to improving TSA,” President Kelley said H.R. 1881 will help ensure that TSA becomes “the best-run airport security agency in the world.”

“Given the crucial position of TSA employees in protecting our nation’s airports and securing the safety of the traveling public, giving them a fair voice in the workplace will undoubtedly serve our country well,” Kelley said.

In addition to seeking support for H.R. 1881, NTEU continues to work with the Obama administration to secure collective bargaining rights through executive action. The TSA administrator was given the power to decide whether or not employees should have collective bargaining rights under the law establishing the agency; to date, no TSA administrator has seen fit to allow agency employees to have full collective bargaining rights.

TSOs are among the few federal employees without federal civil service protections, President Kelley said. “Providing them with collective bargaining rights would give TSOs a renewed stake in the success of airport security nationwide and would allow them to partner with management in fulfilling the agency’s overall mission.”

Not only are civil service protections for TSOs a priority issue for NTEU, they also are a key component of NTEU’s comprehensive five-point plan for the TSA workforce. The union represents thousands of TSA employees at several of the nation’s busiest airports and is actively organizing workers at many others nationwide.

NTEU is the largest independent federal union, representing 150,000 employees in 31 agencies and departments.