Ames Federal Employees Union

So are we, and the Union is going to be requesting negotiations on the impact and implementation of the switchover to NOMAD. Some of what we are already concerned about include:

• financial impacts to the end-users
• privacy of e-mails and rights of employees to be notified when their e-mail is being inspected
• protections for employees adversely affected by performance and reliability issues
• guarantees of support for a variety of tools and platforms (i.e. Linux, Thunderbird, etc.)
• guarantees of support for e-mail forwarding for old e-mail addresses
• discussions of space allowances and limitations

This is an opportunity for you to raise your issues and to have the Union negotiate with management on reasonable accommodation to your issues. Either add a comment to this blog entry (comments are moderated, so they may not show up immediately) or send e-mail to negotiate@afeu.org .

– Your AFEU NOMAD Negotiations Team

(A related Press Release went out today regarding this bill.)

To All IFPTE Locals,

I wanted to inform you all that the Bush Administration has issued the below veto threat to the IFPTE supported NASA funding bill. It is important to point out that not only does this bill include RIF defund language aimed at protecting NASA’s Civil Servant workforce, it also contains critically important minimum level funding for key NASA programs supported by IFPTE members. Also, this funding is important for the safety of the flying public, as well as for government contractors like Boeing (aeronautics research performed at NASA).

Given the anti-worker, anti-Civil Servant, anti-Science policies of this Administration, this veto threat is not surprising. However, it is worth sharing with all of you so that the IFPTE membership can see it first hand.

Many thanks are in order to Subcommittee Chairman Mollohan (D, WV), who put together a pretty good bill in a time of extremely tight fiscal resources, and in the face of a veto threat by the Administration. We can only hope that the Democratically controlled Congress will continue to produce good funding bills for the workers and for the American taxpayer despite these misguided threats from the Administration.

Here is a portion of the Statement of Administration Policy (SAP) detailing the veto threat.

______

“Because Congress has failed to demonstrate such a path, if H.R. 3093 were presented to the President, he would veto the bill. …

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) - The Administration supports the House’s full funding for NASA’s Exploration Systems and Space Shuttle. However, the Administration does not endorse funding in excess of the request for Aeronautics, Education, and Science, where increases for near-term support would create unsustainable outyear funding requirements. The Administration also strongly objects to reductions to the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite Continuation Project that would reduce the future system availability of critical space communications capabilities for NASA and other partner agencies. The Administration further objects to the proposed establishment of several new appropriations accounts in FY 2008, that are not necessary and would adversely impact NASA’s financial management system, processes, and controls.”

_________________________________________________________
Matthew S. Biggs
Assistant to the President/Legislative Director
International Federation of Professional &
Technical Engineers (IFPTE), AFL-CIO

Some tips:

1. HR and the Union agree that supervisors should use the Word document format for plans, based upon the sample standards developed jointly. The EPCS form from HQ leaves far too little space to develop reasonable standards.
2. Standards should objectively distinguish between the three levels of performance, the more objective the standards, the better for you, and for your supervisor. Supervisors, however, are likely to try to make them as general as possible so that they can exert the greatest amount of discretion as to how to rate people, but they run the risk of losing a grievance over the rating if the employee disagrees.
3. Your “plan” is fluid, and not limited to what is written in the official performance plan. Your supervisor can give you direction and change your plan verbally or in writing (hopefully the latter) at any time, but he/she must give you 90 days to perform the new plan in order to rate you on that new plan. If your plan changes significantly, suggest to your supervisor that the plan be revised. This can be done at any time. Management is under the gun to get something out, work with them and with their time line, but that does not mean they cannot work with you to clarify and improve your plan after the deadline.
4. Your plan should be reasonable for a person at your grade level, and should be consistent with your position description.
5. Sign your plan, if you agree with it.
6. If you have any problems, issues, or concerns, raise them with your supervisor and if he/she is unwilling to address your concerns, contact your HR rep or the Chief Steward and we can consider formal action or other methods of resolving the issue.