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Portland, Ore.—The leader of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) met yesterday with Transportation Security Administration (TSA) Officers at Oregon’s largest airport to hear firsthand about current issues that are negatively impacting the workplace. The meeting was held at Portland International Airport (PDX) where, earlier this year, NTEU established Chapter 333 (TSA Oregon) to represent officers at PDX and other airports across the state.

NTEU President Colleen M. Kelley said she was grateful for the opportunity to meet with TSA Officers in Portland. “I have always been impressed with the dedication that these frontline transportation security professionals bring to their jobs,” Kelley said. “That is why NTEU believes it is so important that they have effective, on-the-ground workplace representation.”

All NTEU TSA chapters operate with local staff attorneys and labor relations experts to represent officers on a variety of critical workforce issues, such as disciplinary actions and workplace safety measures. Aside from TSA, NTEU also represents hundreds of other federal employees in Oregon with local chapters of the Internal Revenue Service and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). NTEU also has a chapter of TSA Officers at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.

In addition to addressing ongoing workforce concerns, President Kelley also reminded officers at the meeting that bringing collective bargaining to TSA remains a top NTEU priority. “For years, NTEU has been responding to the concerns of hardworking officers who are committed to the agency’s mission, but lack a meaningful voice at work,” she said.

Collective bargaining at TSA is not only a priority issue for NTEU, it also is a key component of the union’s comprehensive five-point plan for the entire TSA workforce—a concrete set of goals to help address the concerns of employees nationwide. The plan also includes fair pay, a fair shift-scheduling system and adequate staffing; improvements to the current TSA training and recertification system and full whistleblower protections by statute.

Full collective bargaining rights for TSA Officers have been denied since the agency’s inception in 2001, and NTEU has led the fight to see that officers have such rights to allow them to address several ongoing workplace concerns.

In a dual-approach, NTEU has taken its concerns to Congress, where it worked for the introduction of H.R. 1881, a pending measure in the U.S. House of Representatives that would provide TSA Officers with full collective bargaining rights by statute. The union also continues to consult with key members of the Obama administration, including new TSA Administrator John S. Pistole, over granting these rights administratively.

President Kelley recently met face-to-face with Administrator Pistole and shared the results of an NTEU-initiated survey—conducted by a respected private polling firm—showing that fully 85 percent of TSA officers nationwide believe that collective bargaining rights would help improve overall agency effectiveness. “By developing credible and transparent workplace processes, collective bargaining will transform TSA into a world-class transportation security agency,” Kelley said.

Collective bargaining rights are widespread throughout the federal workplace, including within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), where NTEU is the exclusive representative of the 24,000-employee CBP workforce. Both TSA and CBP are DHS units.

NTEU is the largest independent federal union in the country, representing 150,000 employees in 31 agencies and departments, including thousands of TSA Officers at airports from coast to coast.