official time

Federal employee unions have until Jan. 10 to inform the Department of Veterans Affairs whether they would stay and pay rent or leave their currently occupied, government-owned VA office space. The president’s 2018 workforce executive orders require unions to pay rent in order to continue using agency property.

The Trump administration has clarified how agencies should proceed with current, ongoing collective bargaining negotiations with federal employee union, now that the president’s workforce executive orders are in full force.

After determining the Department of Health and Human Services bargained in “bad faith” with the National Treasury Employees Union, an independent arbitrator has directed both parties to return to the collective bargaining table. HHS, however, can appeal the arbitrator’s decision.

The Office of Personnel Management on Friday instructed agencies to begin implementing the president’s workforce executive orders on official time, collective bargaining and employee removals.

A new collective bargaining agreement between the Social Security Administration and the American Federation of Government Employees gives the union a smaller bank of official time hours than it had before, but more than representatives would see under the president’s workforce executive orders.

The injunction on the president’s workforce executive orders has expired, clearing the way for agencies to officially begin implementing them again.

Executive orders on federal employment, and vigorous union opposition to them, appear to have poisoned relations between federal unions and the Trump administration beyond antidote.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on Wednesday denied unions a chance to rehear their case against the president’s workforce executive orders before a full panel of judges.

New regulations from the Office of Personnel Management implement portions of the president’s May 2018 executive order on firings and disciplinary actions for federal employees.

An American Federation of Government Employees local is suing the Trump administration, the Social Security Administration and the Federal Service Impasses Panel for violating an injunction on the president’s workforce executive orders.