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Nearly 800 flight service specialists on Thursday filed an age discrimination lawsuit in federal court in an attempt to stop the Federal Aviation Administration from contracting out their jobs.

The class action lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by attorneys from the firm Gebhardt & Associates on behalf of 794 federal employees. It alleges that age was a major factor in the FAA's decision to hold a public-private competition for roughly 2,500 flight services jobs and award the work to Lockheed Martin Corp. The 1967 Age Discrimination in Employment Act prohibits such treatment, said Joseph Gebhardt, the lead attorney for the specialists.

The transfer of work to Lockheed on Oct. 1 will mean that older workers close to retirement, but not yet eligible, will see significant reductions in government pension benefits unless they are able to find another federal job, the complaint states. Members of the class action suit are seeking relief from any harm the decision has caused them, including back pay, record correction and attorney fees.

About 1,900 of the affected employees worked directly in flight service controller positions, providing weather briefings, navigational assistance and information on flight restrictions, primarily to pilots of noncommercial aircraft, according to the attorneys for the federal employees. There were about 600 other flight service positions encompassed in the contest for work at 58 flight service stations across the country.

Of the roughly 1,900 employees the complaint defines as "flight service controllers," 92 percent were older than 40 at the time the FAA decided to outsource the work, Gebhardt said. In materials posted on the Internet at the time of the decision and in prior public appearances, FAA officials cited the aging flight service specialist workforce as one of the reasons the jobs made good candidates for a competitive sourcing study, the specialists' legal team alleged.

"There is no reasonable factor other than the age of the workforce that is motivating this contracting-out decision," the complaint states.

But Greg Martin, a spokesman for FAA, said the public-private contest was only about one thing: providing "better service at a better value." Much of the equipment used at the flight services stations was antiquated and in need of repair. At a price tag of more than $500 million a year, the service was also too costly for taxpayers, he said. The FAA has said awarding Lockheed Martin the $1.9-billion, 10-year contract will save more than $2 billion over that time.

Martin noted that more than half of the 2,500 flight service specialists involved in the competition were eligible to retire on Feb. 1, the date of the decision.

Members of the class action lawsuit also claim a contractor would not provide the same quality of service as the federal employees. Within the next month, they will seek an injunction to prevent the FAA from handing over work to Lockheed until the age discrimination case is decided, Gebhardt said.

"Once the [federal flight service specialists] are gone, they're gone," said Kate Breen, president of the National Association of Air Traffic Specialists, the union representing the employees.

The federal employees' case will be bolstered by a Wednesday Supreme Court ruling that supports the filing of age discrimination cases in instances where older employees are disproportionately harmed by a workplace action. The previous threshold for proving age discrimination required lawyers to show intent.

Gebhardt said he thinks he could have shown intent in the FAA case, but noted that he also has a solid argument for disproportionate impact.

COMMENTS

• Hmmmmm. The average age of the civil service is something over 47 and approximately 50% are retirement eligible.... Is there ANY possibility that an action, either against or for, regarding a large group of civil service employees WON'T have a disproportionate impact on older workers? Ya gotta love the AFGE and what they did to the workforce by ensuring that replacements in large part were replaced and put us in this position... Skeptical Posted April 7, 2005 8:14 AM
• This sounds so familiar. In 2000 the Army privatized its logistics support (LSSC) to a contractor and they have not only not gotten the new and improved logistics system (LMP) in place, they're not even a third of the way there. And now they're laying people off because they've run through the money for the contract. And there's no going back to the government-run system. Most of the highly-skilled people who used to maintain the old system (CCSS) are gone or about to retire. What a way to run a country. GovExec.com reader Posted April 1, 2005 1:17 PM
• FAA spokesman Greg Martin's comments are all too typical in this age of outsourcing. He says that the public-private contest was only about one thing: providing "better service at a better value." While that's a popular marketing slogan for outsourcing, it hardly counts as critical analysis. Let's put the hype aside. The FAA, like many government agencies, made the mistake of "boom hiring" decades ago. This is when an agency hires a lot of workers all at once to address a critical labor shortage. The boom is followed by many lean years where very few new people are hired. Boom hiring is a shortsighted management tool. It solves a problem today, but creates many problems tomorrow. Boom hiring creates an artificially homogeneous workforce where most workers are in the same age group. In the beginning it's a fantastic deal for the government because the young workforce has a low average salary. Yet, as the workforce ages it naturally becomes more experienced and more expensive. Towards the end of the cycle salary costs rise to a maximum before the retirement wave crisis. This is just simple economics. The problem with Mr. Martin's comment is that he is looking at the FAA employees only toward the end of their career cycle. Salary costs are at a maximum and so of course it's difficult to compete against a contractor with a mixed age workforce advantage. Yet, if we looked at the total cost of the FAA workforce over a thirty year period we would certainly find they are the better value. Mr. Martin claims the government will save around 2 billion dollars over the next ten years by outsourcing. This savings to the government is questionable at best. If he is simply comparing the cost of an aging workforce to a mix age workforce this only gives an illusion of savings. However, that's just not a realistic model of the workforce over time. Ultimately the FAA employees are victims of poor workforce planning. It is certainly not their fault that they are similar in age, more experience, and have higher salaries. Good managers would have taken corrective action years ago. Yet, all FAA management did was propose another hiring boom in response to the retirement wave. In the end they simply waved the magic wand of "privatization" to make their aging workforce disappear. FAA workers have good cause to take action. GovExec.com reader Posted April 1, 2005 10:45 AM