| Comment Number: | OL-10505668 |
| Received: | 3/11/2005 1:53:09 AM |
| Subject: | Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, Request for Comment |
| Title: | National Security Personnel System |
| CFR Citation: | 5 CFR Chapter XCIX and Part 9901 |
| No Attachments |
Comments:
I am writing to you because of my concern about the National Security Personnel System (NSPS) scheduled for implementation for more than 700,000 employees of the Department of Defense over the next year. During congressional hearings, Donald Rumsfeld has stated that the mission requires greater flexibility in hiring, compensating and assigning federal employees. Perhaps this is so, although this has never been such a stumbling point before. The Secretary and his subordinates have referred to the unions has being obstacles to important Petagon missions.........since when? They have not offered any concrete examples as to how or even why this is. The Secretary of Defense "wants" the same type of command authority over civilian employees as he does with the military. The system as is now, does give us a choice, under the one proposed, NSPS, it seems that choice is gone. When Congress acceded to the broad requests of DOD, they did so with certain restrictions in place, sort of a check and balance I would think. Presently however, those are not being met by the Pentagon, i.e. the observation of the legal requirements of labor relations statutes and the election of unions in the development of the new system. DOD briefings and attempts at soliciting the viewpoints of unions, does not answer the repeated union requests for specific information and issues that union management wishes to address with the adoption of NSPS. The pay for performance system sounds wonderful but is misleading. In the system we have now, most employees feel disgruntled about the advancement, promotion opportunities. In the NSPS, the advancement, promotion and pay decisions are given over to the sole discretion of a supervisor. I don't believe this is better than the one we have now. It is too autocratic and there is not an opportunity given where you may redress any decisions made on the basis of considerations other than merit. For these reasons, I oppose the implementation of NSPS so quickly for so many of us, and I urge you to substantively address the issues raised by the United DOD Workers Coalition, prior to taking any other action.