300+ Workers at NASA’s Washington Headquarters Vote to Form a Union, IFPTE
“This successful vote will allow us to work with management to improve working conditions for NASA support and administrative staff here at NASA headquarters, thereby improving operations, saving money, and retaining an engaged and professional workforce,” said Tifarah Thomas, a program specialist within NASA’s Office of the Chief Health & Medical Officer. Professional support specialists at NASA headquarters include budget analysts, policy analysts, administrative specialists, secretaries, and others.”

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11 replies on “Big Union Vote at NASA HQ”

    1. For what it is worth, Tifarah Thomas is a civil servant. Since that is the case, it would probably be okay to assume that they are all civil servants. Having a mixture of contractors and civil servants could conceivably complicate any collective bargaining done by the union as now there would be multiple parties in negotiations, with conceivably vastly different contracts.

      1. And now that I hit Post, I see that KptKaint already answered this.

        Teach me not read all four comments before shooting my mouth off…..

        1. As a nonunion contractor who could be fired in a second after 25 years of work, I can’t find much sympathy for them. However I know a dedicated and capable CS employee who was nearly demoted (also after many years of hard work) because a manager took a personal dislike to him for trying to clean up the system, and apparently a grievance to the CS union saved his job. So here’s my position. A well managed CS organization doesn’t need a union. But apparently NASA does.

  2. Um, I might get bashed for this, but are conditions that bad at NASA HQ-DC that they need Union intervention? Can a Union really undo or improve the NASA bureaucracy ?

  3. they are federal employees. now the union will get move dues to help fund the campaign’s of federal politicians. there will be no saving money involved.

    1. I’m not sure what sort of savings one would expect here. A union is to protect the rights of employees. It often benefits employers, a well, as it regularized and makes predictable the relationship with regular staff.

      As Jeff notes, such a vote implies that conditions are such that the staff feels the need for the protections that a union offers. Reference is made to “fair, equitable, and respectful” work conditions as the goal, which gives some clue as to the issues in play. The fact that 97% voted in favor shows widespread concern among the affected staff.

      1. Thanks Todd. Now maybe all NASA Centers will receive coverage by a Union for the good of the employees.

      2. Todd, just a slight correction. This is a press release from the union and does not really state all of the facts. It says 320 people were eligible to vote and the vote was 97%. However, it does not say how many people voted.

        There are a lot of rules about this, but since there was an actual election, there was not a majority of people who signed authorization cards. If a majority of eligible people signed the authorization cards, then there would not have been an election. An election occurs when at least 30% of eligible people turn in the authorization cards. Then, if there is an election, if a majority of the people who actually voted select a union, then that becomes their bargaining representative. So, in theory, if 320 people were eligible and they only collected 30% of cards (96 people), and they were the only ones who voted, then 93 people voted for the union (97% of the vote). It is not necessarily 97% of the 320 people who selected the union.

        And these rules are why there are labor lawyers……

        Edit: Actually there is a Washington Post story that has better information:

        http://www.washingtonpost.c…

        It states that 342 people were eligible to vote. Of those eligible, only 58 voted with 56 in favor. So my numbers are way off. In addition, there is already a union at NASA HQ (the NASA Headquarters Professional Association who partners with the Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers) which has 200 people currently represented. These will just also join that union.

  4. I knew the Peter Principle had permanently taken hold at NASA. But now they’re going for the full blown Washington bureaucratization? Incredible!

  5. What garbage. NASA needs to fade into the background as a strictly regulatory agency anyways.

    We don;t expect the FAA to run an airline, and it’s foolish to allow NASA to even touch the hardware of spaceflight anymore.

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