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Law restores FAA employees' appeal rights
Federal Aviation Administration employees will once again be allowed to take complaints against their bosses to the Merit Systems Protection Board, under a bill awaiting President Clinton's signature.
Under the FAA reauthorization bill, H.R. 1000, FAA employees can choose to take their appeals to an internal review panel or to the independent MSPB.
Congress took away FAA employees' MSPB appeals rights in 1995 as part of a personnel reform effort that freed the FAA from most governmentwide personnel rules. The FAA then set up an internal system to handle employees' appeals of adverse personnel actions, such as suspensions.
Under FAA's "Guaranteed Fair Treatment" program, a three-person review panel is formed to handle employee complaints. The employee selects one person, management selects another and a third-party arbitrator is jointly selected from a list of qualified people compiled by the agency. Employees dissatisfied with the panel's decision may appeal to a circuit court of federal appeals.
Critics say the Guaranteed Fair Treatment program does not give employees access to an independent administrative review body. Complaints from the Federal Managers Association and others led Congress to re-instate the MSPB appeal rights in H.R. 1000. Now employees will be able to choose to take their appeals to either MSPB or to the Guaranteed Fair Treatment program.
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