Council 220 of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the union that represents most Social Security employees is not a big fan of lame duck Commissioner Astrue. The Council's current newsletter includes a piece sharply criticizing Astrue. According to the union, Astrue promised during the confirmation process that he would have an "open door" for the AFGE but held only a couple of meetings with union representatives before breaking off all contacts. According to the union, Astrue seemed to be mad that the union had publicly criticized him. The union says that no only would Astrue not meet with its leaders, he would not respond to letters or acknowledge invitations to speak. The piece also criticizes Astrue for doing less than he could have to obtain an adequate budget for his agency:
Although the Commissioner testified before Congress regarding the impact of reduced resources on the ability of SSA to provide adequate services to the public, he has not aggressively addressed this issue with the public. The person in charge of SSA [Social Security Administration] should maintain a highly visible profile, demanding Congress provide the agency with sufficient dollars to provide the services the American public demands and deserves.
Since SSA is an Independent Agency, the Commissioner has a unique opportunity to communicate with the public the need for more resources to prevent office closings, to allow the public more face-to-face access to SSA employees and to provide assistance to the public for all their SSA/SSI issues.
5 comments:
That's probably an indication he is doing a good job.
@ 5:21
Seriously.
This is the same Union that fights tooth and nail to have more "paralegals" (does anyone else see a potential UPL type problem with the use of this designation without meeting State Bar criteria?) as decision writers rather than folks with law degrees who actually understand the ins and outs of legal research, writing, and argumentation. (inb4 decisionwriting isn't the practice of law)
I would give up quite a bit of time, money, etc. if I could somehow be a member of NTEU instead of AFGE like the small number of lucky SSA attorneys...
p.s. the first AFGE publication I saw after starting with SSA had a big article front and center decrying the recent hiring of many attorneys instead of paralegals, effectively telling me I shouldn't be there. Welcome to the Union, I thought...
I'm generally pro-union, but AFGE is worthless. I'd bet a paycheck that if a recertification vote was ever allowed, they'd be gone.
I looked into what it would take to allow attorneys to leave AFGE in favor of NTEU (or any other union, really), and it's nearly impossible. And even if we could jump ship, we'd be forced to hang in the wind without a union for far too long for comfort.
Funny how AFGE doesn't give a crap about its SSA attorneys until they want to leave, potentially lowering AFGE's membership numbers and dues.
AFGE might not like Astrue but I can't imagine Astrue having any problem with AFGE. The union rep I had was never available or of any use as he worked in Tucson and I worked in San Diego where management demanded "next day investigations with or without a rep" many times, usually a day after they were notified of an FLRA complaint against them that was found to have merit (twice) and after EEO counseling or formal filing of a complaint. Hard to imagine Astrue's replacement caring less about employees. AFGE is the first union I've joined and needed and it turned into a ghost, an expensive ghost. The funny thing is when I wasn't a dues paying member and we had a different rep I was helped by AFGE who worked out disagreements. But when I joined it is as if I was dumped. AFGE dues deducted from my pay didn't even get applied to a member account. The rep didn't bother input to the system with my address and name info so I didn't get the discounts. When I told him about this he informed me I "could quit anytime". The same rep and his "assistant" both wrote me that they would "file a grievance on my behave" when extremely untimely accusations were made (five months to three months old). They did nothing on my "behave", nor did they do anything on my behalf. What a joke. But, if Astrue leaves soon I hope he takes Alan Frank with him. Frank as the associate commissioner for OCREO must hate support staff and certainly doesn't have a background in EEO and I'm certain his experience with employee rights is denying them. He and OCREO are held in very, very high esteem by a contract investigator service though who has an exclusive contract for all EEO complaints in an entire region and that, OCREO, 'DCHR staff and Frank make for a huge waste of resources to pretend SSA's EEO complaint process has any value.
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