"Screeners seek a say: As TSA workers in Atlanta join unions, debate reignites"

Wednesday, January 2, 2008

Screeners seek a say: As TSA workers in Atlanta join unions, debate
reignites
By Jim Tharpe
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution


Some of the federal workers who screen your luggage and tell you to take off
your shoes at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport's security gates now
want the right to engage in collective bargaining.

Two Washington-based unions, the National Treasury Employees Union and the
American Federation of Government Employees, have recently established
chapters in Atlanta to represent employees of the Transportation Security
Administration.

Currently, TSA screeners can belong to a union and have their dues deducted
from their pay but cannot participate in collective bargaining, agency
spokesman Jon Allen said.

Some Georgia lawmakers want to keep it that way.

"I have never supported TSA workers having the right to strike because their
service is essential to the safety and security of our citizens," said U.S.
Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.). 

"I cannot support public safety employees having the right to strike,"
Isakson said. "And in addition to the security concerns is the concern that
a TSA strike would shut down aviation in this country."

Union officials argue that federal workers cannot strike, even if they are
allowed to participate in collective bargaining, and they discount arguments
that airport security would be hurt by security workers being granted more
power.

"It's a bogus fear and an excuse not to grant them collective-bargaining
rights," said National Treasury Employees Union President Colleen Kelley.

There were unsuccessful attempts in 2007 to grant TSA workers
collective-bargaining rights, and Kelley said those efforts will intensify
in the next few years.

"If it doesn't happen in 2008, we are laying all the groundwork to make it
happen the year after the presidential election," she said.

The issue has been a thorny one in Georgia, where it played a key role in
the 2002 U.S. Senate race between former Sen. Max Cleland, a Democrat, and
Republican challenger Saxby Chambliss. 

Cleland, like many of his Democratic counterparts, backed the rights of
Department of Homeland Security workers to unionize. Chambliss was opposed.

An underdog in the race, Chambliss defeated Cleland in the heated,
post-Sept. 11 atmosphere of that election.

Kelley said in a telephone interview that about 400 TSA workers at
Hartsfield-Jackson have signed up for her union. Hartsfield-Jackson Chapter
310 is the union's second TSA chapter; the other is at John F. Kennedy
International Airport in New York.

The TSA in Atlanta has about 850 full-time employees out of a total staff of
about 950. 

Nationally, about 4,300 transportation security officers out of 43,000 total
have joined a union, TSA's Allen said.

Kip Hawley, the man who runs TSA, told a U.S. Senate committee earlier this
year that granting his agency's workers collective-bargaining rights could
impair airport security.

"Collective bargaining with a third party on behalf of our [transportation
security officers] would not provide the flexibility required to wage war
against terrorism," Hawley said.

Any reduction in TSA's ability to shift resources or focus on a specific
airport based on new intelligence would diminish the agency's effectiveness
"and put the American public at greater risk," he said.

Hawley said security workers already have "numerous avenues" for resolving
job disputes. 

He said they also have whistle-blower protections comparable to those of
other Homeland Security workers. Both unions have cited expanded
whistle-blower protection as one of their key goals for security officers.


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