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The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and NASA have made changes to Performance Management policy since evaluations were issued last year. We want to ensure you understand these changes so you have the best chance of receiving a fair rating.
Exercising our right to vote is one of the most fundamental ways we participate in our democracy and shape the future of our country. Our vote impacts who will lead our local and national stage, and the policies, funding and legislation that directly impact federal agencies and our federal workforce. We strongly encourage our membership to make plans to vote in the upcoming nationwide general elections which will take place on November 3rd. To find information on your options for casting your ballot and your voter registration status you can consult the non-partisan Vote 411 site: https://www.vote411.org/ which provides a one-stop location to access information on voting for voting eligible residents of all 50 states. We also want to also bring your attention to your ability and limitations to take administrative leave as a NASA federal employee in order to vote.
GESTA recently helped a GESTA member who informed us that they had received a proposed letter of removal from the federal service. GESTA’s grievance committee jumped into action and met with our colleague to gather the facts and to hear their side of the story. We helped this member collect their thoughts and formulate an effective written response that refuted each claim against them. In the end, GESTA was able to assist our member in negotiating a deal which allowed them to resign with a clean record in lieu of the original proposed termination.
The Trump administration and the Office of Personal Management (OPM) have proposed new regulations that would limit the ability for NASA and other federal workers to obtain high performance ratings. A Government Executive article covers these proposed regulation changes which would require a forced distribution on employees ratings. The article describes the numerous issues with such a change noting that “agency representatives across government… nearly universally panned it in internal discussions, warning that its adoption would decrease employee performance and abandon merit systems principles.” The proposed changes are now out for public comments with public comments due by March 26th. A strategy for these comments is to raise multiple unique concerns that will require a response. We encourage you to submit a comment here by clicking the green ‘Submit an Public Comment’ at the top of the page. For guidance on what makes a good comment on proposed rule changes, you can see this document (relevant advice starting on page 2) from the Federal Union Network.
On January 14th GESTA members and allies, as well as IFPTE leadership, rallied on Capitol Hill with other federal union members in support of the The Protect American Workforce Act (PAWA).
Freedom of speech is a fundamental right we all still retain as federal employees. This freedom under the 1st amendment protects our ability to speak freely to the public while in our capacities as private citizens on matters that are of public concern (including sharing non-controlled information on matters of public concern which we have access to due to our unique roles as federal employees) when it does not interfere with, and is not a part of our ordinary job duties (see: 1 & 2). Whistleblower protection laws also further protect federal employees from retaliation for public disclosures of certain types of whistleblower information. Recently a federal union president, Ellen Mei, of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) representing employees at the Department of Agriculture (USDA) was given notice she would be fired in retaliation for a press interview she did warning the public about the government shutdown’s impacts to SNAP benefits. GESTA leadership has signed on to the petition protesting her firing for this protected speech, and you can also add your name to this petition, which has been organized by the Federal Union Network, at this link.
We want to provide clarification on your right as a federal employee to petition and provide information to Congress including on issues impacting the federal workplace, Goddard and NASA. The right to do so is protected by law under 5 USC 7211 which states "The right of [US government] employees, individually or collectively, to petition Congress or a Member of Congress, or to furnish information to either House of Congress, or to a committee or Member thereof, may not be interfered with or denied." Note such activity is not partisan/political activity since it is not advocating for the election/non-election of a particular individual or a particular party to a political position and is therefore not subject to Hatch Act restrictions.
Below we provide a step-by-step walk through of the NASA Office of Inspector General (OIG) Hotline page for reporting information and concerns related to crime, waste, fraud and abuse.
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