June 6, 2008

Dear CBP Employee:

I am writing to update you on the first week of bargaining over the CBP contract. It was a turbulent week but ended better than we anticipated with management making some major shifts in its initial positioning.

As I noted in my earlier communication to you, when CBP management delivered its proposed new collective bargaining agreement, it was abundantly clear what kind of future the agency was proposing for you. Under this proposal, you would have no rights to bid into jobs, to earn overtime, to get back pay when managers mistreat them, to work alternative work schedules or to plan on regular days off.

Basically, CBP was proposing a contract without one single enforceable right, other than what is proscribed by law.

Prior to the start of negotiations, it was clear that CBP was attempting to manipulate the bargaining process by trying to ensure that these anti-employee proposals would be imposed by the management-friendly Federal Services Impasse Panel (FSIP.) NTEU responded to this by refusing to sign the ground rules agreement imposed by the FSIP, bargaining under protest, and requesting a “stay” of the Panel’s ground rules decision before the Federal Labor Relations Authority.

The week’s bargaining got off to a rocky start. Management had chosen a room that was far too small for all the people on the two teams (bargaining was later relocated to a larger room) and then tried to intimidate NTEU’s team by announcing it would be charging our team annual leave for their lunch hour.

Then, there was the hurdle with the make-up of management’s team. NTEU believes that negotiating this agreement is a job for the best, brightest, and most experienced field managers the agency has.

After all, NTEU brought in five CBP employees with over 125 years of CBP experience among them from just about every type of port. It would take CBP's most skilled field managers to talk substantively about important, detailed topics such as bid and rotation systems, overtime and alternative work schedules.

Instead, CBP decided to fill four out of its five team slots with labor relations specialists rather than proven field managers who have actually worked at a port.

Our team’s experience was evident when an LR specialist would try to describe what happens in the ports and our chapter presidents would set them straight. By the week’s end, management agreed that it would bring DFO leaders to the table to talk about working conditions.

During the week, NTEU gained an advantage when we learned that we had won a key arbitration victory over the agency that compels management to honor “institutional benefits” such as official time and providing NTEU with facilities and information to adequately represent employees that were added to our bargaining unit.

Our greatest hurdles were management’s proposal and the FSIP ground rules. By the week’s end, NTEU convinced management to put its proposal aside and begin bargaining by focusing on what worked and what did not work in the NTEU-Customs agreement.

This is far better than throwing out a proven agreement and starting from scratch. This should allow for far more productive problem-solving discussions. Management also agreed to temporarily set aside the FSIP ground rules, a crucial fairness issue for NTEU. Bargaining will resume in late July.

I want to thank the bargaining team of chapter leaders for working so patiently and skillfully on your behalf. I will be appointing future bargaining teams as appropriate, depending on the issues on the table.

It is early in the process, and as you know, these undertakings are never easy and often protracted, but NTEU is persistent in ensuring that your rights are protected and your interests represented.

I hope that CBP will use this opportunity to unify its workforce and boost morale, to improve its relationship with NTEU and make CBP an agency that attracts and retains the best professional workforce in the world.

In the meantime, NTEU will continue to use all the other tools it has to improve your working conditions. One prime example is that, next month, CBP Officers will be able to take advantage of enhanced retirement benefits courtesy of NTEU's successful, years-long fight for Law Enforcement Officer (LEO) status.

Meanwhile, NTEU will continue to update members on the bargaining process through e-mail communications and its web site for DHS employees, www.DHSunion.org.

Colleen M. Kelley
National President