May 2016 Federal Employment Law Training Group Newsletter
Did you ever have friends over for dinner, enjoy a nice time, and then everyone goes home, except one couple? They enjoy your company so much (and your good wine) that they are just getting started with the evening when others are looking for their coats and their car keys. You politely hang in there, propping your eyes open with toothpicks, listening to their never-ending hilarious (to them) stories about themselves, silently praying to the gods for a power outage so you’ll have a reason to shoo them out of your living room. Not only do you want them to leave, your preference would be that you never invite them back again. Well, do you know who feels that way about you, that you’ve overstayed your welcome and it would be best if you never returned? The judges at MSPB. Yes, they conduct your little hearing and adjudicate your little case. But if it were up to them, you’d be smart enough to get rid of problem employees without having to do something that can be appealed to the Board. It’s not that they don’t like you or respect your role in government to hold employees accountable. It’s that they have a lot to do and you’re causing them more work when you fail to find an alternative to a formal removal. And that’s why I have to believe that the MSPB judges are thrilled to see that here at good old FELTG, we are offering a program the first week of November to teach you how to implement removal alternatives, to get rid of your problem employees without having to defend the agency in an appeal to the Board. So come to the party. Make a Board judge happy. Learn to take care of business, and then be done. Join us for Settlement Week October 31 through November 4 and never have to bother another Board judge again.
Agency that Subjected Employee to Racially Motivated Hostile Work Environment Liable for $125,000 in Compensatory Damages
By Deryn Sumner I think that it is worthwhile for practitioners who represent employees and employers to be aware of cases awarding higher awards of compensatory damages. Although $300,000 is the maximum award under the Civil Rights Act of 1991, most non-pecuniary...
BIG NEWS: Title 42 Employees Now Entitled to Appeal Removals to MSPB
By William Wiley OK, it’s BIG NEWS if you have any employees hired under the authority of Title 42 (rather than under Title 5), the authority that allows agencies to appoint special consultants without regard to any civil service laws. 42 USC 209(f). Since the cooling...
Vehicle Misuse
By Barbara Haga Last newsletter, we looked at a case where the supervisor authorized an employee to use a government vehicle for something unofficial, and the supervisor was disciplined for the authorization. This time we are looking at a case where the use was not...
Sanctions: When a Party Generally Just Fails to Follow the Administrative Judge’s Orders
By Deryn Sumner So far in this series on sanctions in federal sector EEO complaints, we’ve talked about the EEOC’s authority to issue sanctions against either party, and three different situations that can give rise to sanctions: agencies failing to timely complete...
Prior Discipline Continues to Lose Respect at the Board
By William Wiley My initial training in this business was in July 1977. Back in the day, the old Civil Service Commission ran weekly academies year-round in Washington, DC, with an academy devoted to each major personnel discipline: classification, staffing, training,...
Don’t Come to Mediation if You’re not Willing to Budge
By Deborah Hopkins Mediation is an interesting thing. Most disputes resolve without litigation, but for some reason we don’t seem to talk as much about that as we do about the cases that get to hearing or the courts. Obviously, the cases that go to litigation also...
Attorneys Should not Make Management Decisions
By William Wiley Here at FELTG, we do a LOT of training for supervisors. We really enjoy helping front line managers learn the procedures the law provides for dealing with poor performers and civil servants who don’t follow the rules. And during those sessions, we...
EEOC Continues to Focus on Protecting Transgender Employees from Discrimination in the Federal Workplace
By Deryn Sumner Since its decision in Macy v. Dept. of Justice, EEOC No. 0120120821 (April 20, 2012), the Commission has continued to push the law forward to protect transgender employees from discrimination in the federal workplace. Last year saw the issuance of the...
What is the Role of the Union Official in Statutorily-Defined Meetings?
By William Wiley Questions, we get wonderful questions here at FELTG. And the one below from a well-respected senior practitioner raises a couple of issues of importance to all you unionized readers out there: the difference in union rights between a formal discussion...