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Washington, D.C.--As more than 320 local leaders of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) from around the country were on Capitol Hill urging higher pay for federal workers, the Senate today by near-unanimous vote approved legislation that would continue pay parity involving raises for military and federal civilian workers. The vote on the bill, which contains specific language calling for parity, was 94 to 6.

NTEU President Robert M. Tobias, who said that maintaining that historic parity "is a crucial step in having the kind of workforce that Americans need and deserve," applauded both the work of NTEU local leaders here for the union's annual Legislative Conference and the Senate decision as "a step forward in meeting the government's obligation to the men and women who perform the people's work so well."

NTEU is the nation's largest independent federal union, representing more than 155,000 employees in 21 agencies and departments. Under Tobias, it has long been a leader in the drive to close the gap between public and private sector pay.

Higher federal pay and in particular a closing of the gap between public and private sector pay are among NTEU's legislative priorities this year. To cheers from conference delegates, Tobias announced the results of the mid-morning Senate vote at a luncheon attended by Energy Secretary Bill Richardson and Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

Earlier this year, the Senate Armed Services Committee called for a military pay increase next year of 4.8 percent--higher than the 4.4 percent proposed by President Clinton for both military and civilian pay increases in 1999--and recommended continued military-civilian pay parity.

The overwhelming vote in the full Senate "confirms the idea that, as employers, the American people are willing to compete with the private sector to attract and retain the best people to work on their behalf," Tobias said.

At the same time, Tobias repeated the message that NTEU activists had taken to Capitol Hill all this week that attracting and retaining the best for civil service requires compliance with the Federal Employees Pay Comparability Act (FEPCA), a bipartisan law enacted in 1990 to close, in stages, the public?private pay gap. Its mandate has yet to be fully implemented.

"Given the continuing contributions to our nation of the federal workforce," Tobias said, "FEPCA made good sense when it was enacted, and it makes good sense now," particularly in light of the current and projected substantial federal budget surplus.

No single group, he said, contributed more to bringing the federal budget into balance for the first time in some 30 years than did federal employees, whose $220 billion in delayed and denied pay and benefit increases seriously impacted them over more than a dozen years.

Tobias noted that NTEU and other federal unions are continuing their work with the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) on possible changes to the federal compensation system.