12/4/10: In this attached letter, NTEU National President Colleen Kelley shared with SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro NTEU's belief that SEC employees have earned their 2011 pay increase through solid performance over the previous year and should be excluded from any federal pay freeze. Kelley urged Schapiro to stand with NTEU in opposing the application of the pay freeze to SEC employees. “It would be extremely unfair for employees not to receive the performance-based increases that they have worked so hard to achieve,” President Kelley states in the letter.

She further noted that NTEU has a binding collective bargaining agreement with the SEC covering pay increases for 2011. “NTEU, and the SEC employees we represent, certainly expect this agreement to be honored, absent a specific statutory override,” the letter states.

President Kelley pointed out that SEC’s “open range” pay system is different from the General Schedule pay system in that, under the General Schedule, employee base pay increases are broken up into two separate components, an annual comparability adjustment and within grade increases based on performance. The president has indicated that General Schedule employees will continue to receive within-grade increases and promotional pay increases. If within-grade increases are to be excluded from the pay freeze, then it would seem that merit pay increases provided to SEC employees also should be covered by this exclusion. 

NTEU is opposed to a pay freeze for all federal employees and is deeply disappointed that the administration proposed this action without consulting the Union. The Union will explore all options to overturn this proposal including working with Congress. NTEU believes that this attempt to balance the budget on the backs of federal employees is wrong and will lead to the loss of experienced and knowledgeable federal workers.

NTEU will keep you apprised of further developments. To learn more about NTEU’s efforts, visit our Legislative Action Center at www.nteu.org.