The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit recently ruled the U.S. Postal Service was justified in demoting a supervisor to a non-managerial position after he consistently made inappropriate comments and, at one point, dropped his pants at work.
Federal agency managers need to be more forthcoming with the information they use in their decisions to fire employees. Due to a February 2011 U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruling, the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board is no longer inclined to consider an agency’s omission of such information from removal notices as a harmless procedural error.
Just when you thought that one Agency survived the politicization of the current administration, the MSPB reverses thirty years of case law to grant employees who shouldn’t have a Federal job in the first place the same appeal rights as those who have earned those rights. The Author points out that two of the members involved in the decision have extensive experience arguing cases for unions, two of which filed amicus briefs. Neither recused herself.
USDA eventually found that an HR assistant had worked out a settlement with a previous federal employer to undo her removal by that agency. Her new employer also fired her.
In an Air Force case, a registered nurse is fired and stays fired despite the court’s “discomfort with the harshness” of the removal penalty.
The 12 factors enumerated by the new MSPB in “Curtis Douglas, et. al. v Veterans Administration, et. al.” changed the way we administer discipline in the Federal sector. It’s time to consider limiting them to 10 factors.
Why doesn’t Congress fix the tangled web of federal personnel cases clogging up the courts? Appeals channels are notoriously complex and cases take far too long.
For three decades, federal HR has been working with the 12 “factors” from an MSPB decision. However, much has changed since then.
A post office Supervisor who was demoted to Clerk based on unsatisfactory performance failed to convince the appeals court to mitigate the penalty to a suspension.
A surviving widow of a retired federal employee tried without success to convince OPM, the MSPB and the appeals court that her deceased husband had provided her a survivor’s annuity.
