FederalDaily - November 17, 2006
ILO Says TSA Workers Should Be Able to Organize
Transportation Security Administration (TSA) screeners should be able to organize and bargain collectively,
says an international labor body in a non-binding recommendation. The International Labor Organization
(ILO) rejected the Bush administration’s claims that allowing TSA workers to unionize would endanger
national security, said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney and American Federation of Government Employees
President John Gage in a joint statement Nov. 14. ILO said the TSA violated the fundamental rights
of 56,000 airport screeners by attempting to limit their collective bargaining rights. In 2002, TSA
attempted to deny representation and collective bargaining rights to airport screeners on the basis
of national security, the statement said. But national security and worker rights are not mutually
exclusive, the ILO said. “We implore the Bush administration to follow the ILO’s recommendations
and immediately grant collective bargaining rights to TSA workers,” the union leaders said. For
more, go to: www.aflcio.org/mediacenter/prsptm/pr11152006.cfm
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Corps of Engineers Abandons Privatization Review
The Army Corps of Engineers (ACoE) drops plans to conduct an Office of Management and Budget (OMB)
A-76 privatization review of 2,000 employees who operate and repair the nation’s locks and dams,
a federal employees union said. In an ACoE letter obtained by American Federation of Government Employees
(AFGE) Nov. 15, the agency said it was dropping the A-76 review in favor of an 18-month High Performing
Organization (HPO) review. The HPO survey will not endanger any federal civilian jobs, Ray Navidi,
ACoE strategic sourcing program manager, said in the letter. Furthermore, Navidi said that the HPO
review will look “at current processes and improving them based on the experience of those most
familiar with the work.” AFGE applauded the agency’s decision. “After all, nobody
knows better how to make the locks and dams as effective and efficient as they are safe and secure
as (ACoE’s) rank-and-file locks and dams personnel.” AFGE said. To see more, go to: www.afge.org/Index.cfm?Page=PressReleases&PressReleaseID=679
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Group Blames Air Crashes on Poor Staffing, FAA
A traffic controllers association said the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) decision
to close a local Indiana air-traffic control station at night contributed to a pair of fatal plane
crashes in Indiana this year. The National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA) said on Nov.
15 that a review of both accidents indicated that the aircraft were under the control of the Indianapolis
Air Route Traffic Control Center because the Terre Haute Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) was
closed for the night. The crash last month of a twin-engine plane on approach to the Mid-American Air
Center in Lawrenceville, Ill.—and the accident earlier this year at the Bloomington, Ind., airport—were
the result of the reduced quality of air traffic services because the Terre Haute facility was closed,
NATCA said. Controllers “expressed their deep frustration and concern over their belief that
the worst-case scenario has emerged because of the FAA’s decision to transfer control away from
the appropriate TRACON, to the center, and thus has degraded the margin of safety,” the association
said. To see more, go to: www.natca.org/mediacenter/press-release-detail.aspx?id=400
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