Home Media Center News Releases

Washington, D.C.—While the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) supports the administration’s proposed fiscal 2004 budget of more than $841 million for the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the leader of the union representing more than 2,000 agency employees also called upon Congress to give proper oversight to ensure that the agency fully funds pay and benefit parity for employees.

NTEU led the successful fight for pay parity for SEC employees, winning congressional approval in 2002, but the administration failed to adequately fund it, and the agency then unilaterally adopted a new pay system providing hefty increases to managers while failing to bring SEC front-line employees into parity with other similar agencies.

“The amount proposed in the fiscal 2004 budget,” NTEU President Colleen M. Kelley said, “would provide the resources to fulfill the congressional intent that SEC employees have pay and benefits that are competitive with other federal financial regulatory agencies.”

She made the comments as newly-installed SEC Chairman William H. Donaldson appeared before a Senate subcommittee considering the agency’s proposed budget of $841.5 million, a record amount that comes in the wake of numerous corporate accounting scandals which point to the need for skilled and experienced SEC employees.

“I urge Congress to approve the budget request, and to insist that the agency use the money for the pay and benefit improvements that Congress clearly intended with the pay parity legislation,” President Kelley said.

Everyone who has examined the SEC’s needs—NTEU, the agency, Congress and the administration—understands that this key regulatory body needs additional qualified staff, she said. To that end, NTEU and the SEC recently agreed on certain hiring flexibilities that would enable the agency to boost its complement of accountants, economists and examiners, while protecting their civil service rights and protections. The thrust of the agreement is embodied in pending legislation.

Moreover, Kelley said, the SEC needs to retain its current employees. In the past, the agency has been plagued by high turnover, due, in part, to noncompetitive pay and benefits.

As the largest independent federal union, NTEU represents some 150,000 federal employees in 29 agencies and departments.