Ridge promises cooperation with union leaders

Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge has promised to involve federal union leaders in setting new personnel rules for the new Homeland Security Department, union leaders said.

Ridge met with the presidents of the two largest federal unions in the Roosevelt Room of the White House on Nov. 25, shortly after President Bush signed the law creating the new department. Ridge did not discuss specific plans for the department's personnel, but told American Federation of Government Employees President Bobby Harnage and National Treasury Employees Union President Colleen Kelley that the unions would be involved in the development of a personnel system for the department's 170,000 employees.

The union leaders expect to meet with Ridge in the next couple of weeks to start figuring out how the employees, drawn from 22 agencies across government, will be affected when they become Homeland Security Department workers.

"I'm willing to give Gov. Ridge the benefit of the doubt," Kelley said. "He did not have to reach out and initiate those conversations."

Union leaders and Bush administration officials have had tense relations over the past two years. Relations were particularly tense during debate over the new department in Congress, when Bush administration officials fought for increased power over employees in the department and union leaders fought to retain current statutory civil service and collective bargaining rights. In the final legislation, the Bush administration got much of what it wanted, albeit with caveats requiring consultation with unions over any significant changes affecting the department's employees.

The legislation instructs Ridge to provide written notice to union leaders of any changes to pay, hiring, job classification, discipline, performance management and collective bargaining rules. The union leaders then have 30 days to review the proposed changes and offer recommendations. Ridge and union leaders must then spend another 30 days trying to reach agreement on the proposed changes. At the end of that time, if no agreement has been reached, Ridge can simply implement the changes.

"I did ask if we would be involved in discussions and have opportunities to shape these things before the 30-day trigger in the legislation occurs," Kelley said. "I wanted us in the conversation long before that, and there was a commitment to that [from Ridge]."

Before passage of the homeland security legislation, Ridge made several public statements suggesting that unions had gotten in the way of effective homeland security at agencies such as the Customs Service, where employees are represented by the National Treasury Employees Union.

Since passage, however, Ridge has said he will work with the unions to reduce anxiety among the department's workforce.

"There's got to be a lot of anxiety out there," Ridge told Fox News on Nov. 25. "I've just completed a good meeting with a couple of the labor leaders. I mean we want to make sure that we reduce the anxiety about their job security because we want them focused on homeland security."

American Federation of Government Employees spokeswoman Diane Witiak said Ridge's statements are encouraging. "We're hopeful that we'll be able to work with Tom Ridge," Witiak said.

Seventeen unions represent about 40,000 of the department's 170,000 employees.

Mike Randall, president of the National Association of Agriculture Employees, said the administration has provided no information about the new department to his union. The union represents agriculture inspectors who will transfer from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service at the Agriculture Department to the new department.

The jobs of agriculture inspectors, Customs agents and immigration inspectors could be melded under the new department. Bush administration officials have said the work those employees perform on the borders and at ports is duplicative and uncoordinated.

Randall said combining those jobs is a bad idea because of the amount of information each type of inspector must have. Agriculture inspectors, for example, must be knowledgeable in entomology and other biological sciences. "Customs inspectors will make crappy immigration inspectors, agriculture inspectors will make crappy Customs inspectors and immigration inspectors will make crappy agriculture inspectors," Randall said.